Case ID: us-ct-cl_48/html/0499-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "by Mr. Justice Pitney.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

JAMES W. BEACH v. THE UNITED STATES.
    [41 C. ClS. R., 110; 226 U. S. R., 243.]
    
      On the claimant's appeal.
    
    This case is for the use of the claimant’s patented device for the pneumatic transportation of mail matter. The claimant seeks to recover, both upon an express contract and upon an implied contract. It appears that he offered the .right to manufacture and use under his patent for a consideration expressed in his proposals, and that the Postmaster General made no reply thereto, but subsequently contracted with another party for the construction of pneumatic tubes under another device. The claimant insists that this device embraced his invention, protected by his patent, and that his offer of the right to use for a consideration named, with the retention of his proposals and the subsequent use of his device, constitute an express contract. The claim for an implied contract rests upon substantially the same facts.
    The court below decides:
    I. Under the act 18th July, 1892 (27 Stat. L., 145, § 6), the Postmaster General was authorized to examine into the subject of more rapid dispatch of mail matter in cities by means of pneumatic tubes or other systems, and to report the costs, advantages, etc.; but he had no authority in this experimental stage to enter into a contract binding the United States for the use of a patented device.
    II. Under the act 21st April, 1902, (32 Stat. L., pp. 107, 114), the Postmaster General was authorized to contract for the transmission of mail by means of pneumatic tubes, but only after public advertisement tberefor, and not until after a careful investigation as to tbe means and practicability of sucb service, nor until a favorable report in writing shall have been submitted to the Postmaster General by a commission of not less than three expert public officials. The Postmaster General was not authorized to contract with anyone whose contract did not comply with these conditions.
    III. Where the claimant, an inventor, sent his proposals to the Postmaster General offering his patented pneumatic mail transportation device for a price specified, and the Postmaster General made no reply, neither accepting the bid nor rejecting it, but subsequently entered into a contract with another patentee for pneumatic tubes, to be constructed under his device, there was no express contract with the claimant, though the tubes furnished to the. defendants may have embraced elements of the claimant’s invention and have constituted an infringement of his patent.
    IV. Where the claimant offered his device to the Postmaster General and the Postmaster General contracted with another inventor for pneumatic tubes to be constructed according to the latter’s device, the case is identical with Sehillinger’s Case (155 U. S. R., 163.) No contract can be implied. If the device used infringed on the claimant’s invention, his remedy was against the contractor for the infringement. The court is without jurisdiction of an action for infringement by the United States. The cases relating to patent litigation in this court reviewed.
    The decision of the court below is affirmed on the same grounds.
    December 2, 1913,
   by Mr. Justice Pitney.

The. opinion of the Supreme Court was delivered