Source: https://hallingblog.com/tag/hotchkiss-v-greenwood/
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 23:24:12+00:00

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The generally agreed beginning of section 103 is the Supreme Court case of Hotchkiss v. Greenwood, 52 U.S. (11 How.) 248 (1851). This case first articulated the idea that an improvement that was the subject of a patent had to be more than “the work of the skilful mechanic.” The case involved making door and other knobs of all kinds of clay used in pottery, and of porcelain. The Supreme Court decision made the common error of pointing out that each of the elements in the invention were individually known.
But in the case before us, the knob is not new, nor the metallic shank and spindle, nor the dovetail form of the cavity in the knob, nor the means by which the metallic shank is securely fastened therein. All these were well known, and in common use, and the only thing new is the substitution of a knob of a different material from that heretofore used in connection with this arrangement.
Every invention in the history of the world is a combination of known elements/steps. The reason for this is Conservation of Matter and Energy – you cannot create something from nothing. This idea is implicit in 35 USC 112, which requires the inventor explain their invention so that one skilled in the art can practice the invention.
Back to Hotchkiss, the ruling states the well known idea that for an invention to be patentable, it must be more than just the work of a skillful mechanic. Today this is stated as the invention must have taken more than just the work of “one skilled in the art.” For a very interesting discussion of the history of the nonobviousness requirement see Novelty and the Hotchkiss Standard.
Note that Justice Woodberry ‘s dissent in the Hotchkiss case argued that the statute only required the invention be new and did not say anything about the work of a skillful mechanic. Was there any justification in the statute for the Supreme Court’s ruling in Hotchkiss? The 1790 Patent Act stated that the Patent Board was only to grant a patent if the invention was “sufficiently useful and important.” The patent statute of 1836 also contained a clause that said the Patent Office could deny a patent to an invention the Commissioner deemed to be “insufficiently useful and important.” However, it appears that this part of the statute was almost never invoked. Either way, the statute did not give this power to the Supreme Court or any other Court. As a result, Hotchkiss was a clear case of judicial activism. The Court just made up a requirement that was not in the statute and could not be considered just an interpretation of the law.
Based on the wording and the fact that section 103 was added later than the novelty requirement, logically 103 is intended to be an additional requirement above the novelty requirement. According to Dictionary.com, novelty means “of a new kind; different from anything seen or known before: a novel idea.” The non-obviousness requirement logically requires something more than an invention be novel. According to Dictionary.com, obvious means, “easily seen, recognized, or understood; open to view or knowledge; evident.” It is axiomatic to patent law that whether an invention is non-obvious, has to be determined at the time the invention was made or in other words before the invention was known. How can an invention that has not been created, be easily seen, recognized, or understood; open to view or knowledge or evident (obvious)? Clearly, an invention that has not been made cannot be open to view and how can you have knowledge of something that does not yet exist? Evident means, according to Dictionary.com, “plain or clear to the sight or understanding.” Is it any wonder that non-patent attorney judges cannot make sense of Patent Law? The law is contradictory on its face.
The drafters of the Constitution only defined ONE RIGHT in the Constitution and that was the Right of inventors and authors. When the founders talked about ‘the right’ they meant a Natural Right. A natural right is a right that exists, whether government exists or not – of course enforcing that right is another story, which is why governments are instituted among men, see Declaration of Independence.
If the Constitution says that inventors have a right in their discoveries, the first question should be: what is an invention? Some people have suggested that an ‘invention’ can be anything that Congress decides it is. But this is clearly nonsense. If that were the case, then the Constitution would be meaningless. This is not ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ words have meaning. So what is an invention? Inventions belong to the genus or class of human creations. However, not all human creations are inventions. For instance, a painting or a musical score is a human creation, but it is not an invention. Reproduction or making another copy of something is not invention and not a creation in the sense used herein.
We need to differentiate inventions from other human creations. Inventions belong to the species of human creations that have an objective result. What do I mean by an objective result? Examples will probably be the best way to examine this. A painting is a human creation, but it is not an invention. A painting has a subjective result – namely the viewer’s reaction. Logically, all human creations either have an objective or a subjective result or goal, there is no other choice. This point can appear confusing with respect to mathematics. Does a Fourier Transform have an objective result? For patent attorneys, the requirement is commonly referred to as the invention must be ‘useful’ under 101. The synthesis of a new chemical is not patentable if the inventor cannot describe a practical use (industrial applicability) for the chemical. The same is true of mathematical formulas. The definition of an invention requires that it be useful or have, what I call, an objective result, which explains the basis of 101. A mathematical formula by itself is not useful or does not have an objective result.
An invention is a human creation, which means that a human was the creator of the invention. That person is called the inventor. Because we are discussing creation, not reproduction, to be the inventor you have to be first. That is where the Novelty (102) requirement comes from. There is nothing in the definition of Invention that implies any sort of non-obviousness requirement or ‘more than a skilled mechanic.’ Neither the Supreme Court nor Congress have the power to ignore the Constitution, which requires that The Exclusive Rights of inventors be secured. Therefore, 35 USC 103 is unconstitutional.
The origin of Section 103 was a Supreme Court case that failed to follow the law. The more than a skilled mechanic grew into the nonsense of requiring a flash of genius. The codification of this bit of judicial activism results in the non-obviousness requirement for patents. This terminology was double speak: requiring something that was unknown to be apparent. The definition of invention does not include any sort of non-obviousness requirement and the Constitution requires Congress and the Courts to uphold the exclusive rights of inventors. As a result, section 103 is unconstitutional.
Words have meanings and judicial activism has consequences. The non-obviousness standard has inhibited the creation and introduction of new technologies and therefore made us all poorer. As just one example of this see Robert Kerns, inventor of the intermittent windshield wiper. Because of the non-obviousness standard, automobile manufacturers were able to steal his invention and drag out court cases for years. Robert Kerns had a PhD. in electrical engineering and was an intelligence officer in the armed forces as a teenager. Instead of inventing or teaching, Dr. Kearns spent his life litigating against an auto industry that felt no shame in stealing his invention. Another tragic example is that of Edwin Armstrong, inventor of the superheterodyne receiver and FM. RCA’s theft of FM radio destroyed this genius to the determent of all mankind.
This improvement consists in making said knobs of potter’s clay, such as is used in any species of pottery; also of porcelain; the operation is the same as in pottery, by moulding, turning, and burning and glazing; they may be plain in surface and color, or ornamented to any degree in both; the modes of fitting them for their application to doors, locks, furniture, and other uses, will be as various as the uses to which they may be applied, but chiefly predicated on one principle, that of having the cavity in which the screw or shank is inserted, by which they are fastened, largest at the bottom of its depth, in form of a dovetail, and a screw formed therein by pouring in metal in a fused state.
The Supreme Court upon reviewing the case made the common error of pointing out that each of the elements in the invention were known.
All inventions are combinations of known elements since conservation of matter and energy means that you cannot create something from nothing, for more information see KSR: Supreme Ignorance by Supreme Court. As a result, this analysis by the Supreme Court is meaningless and sheds no light on whether the invention should have obtained a patent.
There are a number of problems in the Supreme Court’s ruling in Hotchkiss v. Greenwood. First, where did the Supreme Court get the authority to add an additional requirement above novelty in order for an invention to obtain a patent? The statute at the time did not contain any such additional requirement. It was judicial activism to add a requirement not found in the statute. Another error in the Supreme Court’s reasoning is the use of hindsight. All inventions are obvious in hindsight and must be described in enough detail that they can be practiced by one skilled in the art (ordinary mechanic) to meet the requirement of the social contract of patents. Another error in the case was the failure to recognize that copying by competitors of the invention or success of the invention tend to show that it was non-obvious. Finally, the Supreme Court failed to understand the implications of the laws of physics as they apply to inventions, specifically that conservation of matter means all inventions are combinations of known elements.
The cases decided after Hotchkiss in 1851, both by the Supreme Court and the lower courts, were chaotic. There was no statute governing the additional hurdle an otherwise novel invention must cross before being deemed a patentable invention.
The Supreme Court’s decision in Hotchkiss v. Greenwood resulted in an unworkable standard of patentability, because it was inherently subjective. This increased the uncertainty whether an inventor would obtain a patent for their invention and increased the risk that their patent might be held invalid. It also caused the standard of patentability to vary in different Circuits and the Patent Office. Today this is widely understood to increase the cost of obtaining a patent and decrease the amount of resources invested in inventions. The Supreme Court’s judicial activism in Hotchkiss v. Greenwood resulted in numerous problems that haunt us today. Including the complete nonsense opined by the Supreme Court in the KSR v. Teleflex decision, see KSR: Supreme Ignorance by Supreme Court.
Is there any logical reason for the additional requirement of non-obviousness for patents? The definition of invention according to Free Dictionary online is “to produce or contrive (something previously unknown) by the use of ingenuity or imagination.” While Merriam Webster (online) defines invention as “a device, contrivance, or process originated after study and experiment.” I will ignore how and invention is created as a criteria and suggest the following definition, “to create something new” as a common sense definition. This definition differentiates production or manufacturing from invention. Production is creating something, but it is not creating something new it is creating something old. If you argue that it is creating something new, then the word new has no meaning in the definition. This definition does not do a good job of differentiating an invention from a new book or painting. It might be argued that a new book is not creating something new, but it is not the same as other books. So I believe this simple common sense definition has to be supplemented. Specifically, I suggest that invention is “to create something new that has an objective result.” By an objective result I mean that goal of an invention is an objective result that can be tested as opposed to a subjective result that is the result of a song being played or a book being read or a painting be viewed. An objective result distinguishes an invention from a new artistic creation.
So how does this common sense definition of invention, “to create something new that has an objective result,” match up with the requirements of patent law (101, 102, 103, 112)? This definition is generally consistent with section 35 USC 101, statutory subject matter. It excludes scientific and mathematical discoveries since these are not creations. Notably it clearly does not exclude software patents. A software enabled invention is clearly a new creation and it has an objective result. The same is true of business methods patents (for more on the nonsense associated with business method patent see – Bilski, Software Patents and Business Method Patents. This definition is clearly consistent with section 102 – new equals novel. Is this definition consistent with section 35 USC 103? No this definition is not consistent with section 103. There is nothing in the definition that suggests a standard above novelty or new. The general reason given for section 103 is that we do not want trivial inventions that just change the size or the weight or some other trivial feature of an existing invention to obtain a patent. If a change in size or weight or color does not make a difference in the objective result, it is not new and it is not an invention. So I believe the definition of invention I have offered covers this issue and therefore there is no reason for an addition standard above novelty. My suggested definition is neither consistent nor inconsistent with section 35 USC 112, since this section does not define what is an invention. Section 112 defines the requirements an inventor must meet to obtain a patent for their invention. Section 112 deals with the social contract between the inventor and society. Overall the common sense definition I suggested for invention fits nicely with patent law, but there is absolutely no logic for a nonobviousness criteria for patents based on this definition. The creation of the nonobviousness standard was judicial activism on the part of the Supreme Court without any statutory justification. The standard has proven to be completely unworkable and completely subjective. Only the CAFC’s jurisprudence before KSR provided any measure of a stability and logic to the section 103. The nonobviousness standard has resulted in increase costs to inventors without any benefit. It has increase the cost of ligation, helped technologies thieves to steal inventions, and decreased the amount invested in new technology.
I suggest the radical notion that logically the nonobviousness standard, 35 USC 103, should be repealed. If it is not repealed then we should demand a statutory definition that is as objective as possible. One objective solution would be to codify the CAFC’s teaching, suggestion, motivation (TSM) test. I have proposed an alternative standard for 35 USC 103 that I believe is even more objective, clearer, and more consistent with reality than the TSM test – see Obviousness Flow Chart . By adopting any of these solutions we will reduce the cost and uncertainty of obtaining a patent and litigating patents. This will increase the value of issued patents and increase the investment in new technologies, which are the only way to increase real per capita income – see The Source of Economic Growth.
While many lawyers will want to immediately jump to the legislative history to interpret the statute, this is only appropriate if the statute is not clear on it face. Based on the wording and the fact that section 103 was added later than the novelty requirement, logically 103 is intended to be an additional requirement above the novelty requirement. According to Dictionary.com, novelty means “of a new kind; different from anything seen or known before: a novel idea.” The nonobviousness requirement logically requires something more than an invention be novel. In order to understand what nonobvious means, lets find out what obvious means. Then anything that does not meet the definition of obvious is nonobvious. According to Dictionary.com obvious means, “easily seen, recognized, or understood; open to view or knowledge; evident.” It is axiomatic to patent law that whether an invention is nonobvious has to be determined at the time the invention was made, in other words before the invention was known. How can an invention that has not been made be easily seen, recognized, or understood; open to view or knowledge; evident (obvious)? Clearly, an invention that has not been made cannot be open to view and how can you have knowledge of something that does not exist. Evident means, according to Dictionary.com, plain or clear to the sight or understanding, which cannot be true of something that does not exist. Unfortunately, this line of examination does not lead to any useful results. No wonder the 1952 Statute has not lead to meaningful clarification of what is patentable!
 Gale R. Peterson, Cox Smith Matthews, “Obviousness / Non-Obviousness Of The Novel Invention: Hotchkiss v. Greenwood to KSR v. Teleflex 35 U.S.C. § 103 – 1851 to 2006.” 11th Annual Advanced Patent Law Institute, October 26-27 2006.
 KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007).

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