Source: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/10-290.ZS.html
Timestamp: 2014-08-22 19:58:57
Document Index: 369324784

Matched Legal Cases: ['§282', '§282', '§282', '§282', '§282', '§282']

MICROSOFT CORP. v
LIMITED PARTNERSHIP et al.
Section 282 requires an invalidity defense to be proved by clear and convincing evidence. Pp. 5–20.
(a) The Court rejects Microsoft’s contention that a defendant need only persuade the jury of a patent invalidity defense by a preponderance of the evidence. Where Congress has prescribed the governing standard of proof, its choice generally controls. Steadman
, 450 U. S. 91
. Congress has made such a choice here. While §282 includes no express articulation of the standard of proof, where Congress uses a common-law term in a statute, the Court assumes the “term … comes with a common law meaning.” Safeco Ins. Co. of America
, 551 U. S. 47
. Here, by stating that a patent is “presumed valid,” §282, Congress used a term with a settled common-law meaning. Radio Corp. of America
v. Radio Engineering Laboratories, Inc.
, 293 U. S. 1
, is authoritative. There, tracing nearly a century of case law, the Court stated, inter alia, that “there is a presumption of [patent] validity [that is] not to be overthrown except by clear and cogent evidence,” id.
, at 2. Microsoft’s contention that the Court’s pre-Act precedents applied a clear-and-convincing standard only in two limited circumstances is unavailing, given the absence of those qualifications from the Court’s cases. Also unpersuasive is Microsoft’s argument that the Federal Circuit’s interpretation must fail because it renders superfluous §282’s additional statement that “[t]he burden of establishing invalidity … shall rest on the party asserting” it. The canon against superfluity assists only where a competing interpretation gives effect “ ‘to every clause and word of a statute.’ ” Duncan
, 533 U. S. 167
. Here, no interpretation of §282 avoids excess language because, under either of Microsoft’s alternative theories—that the presumption only allocates the burden of production or that it shifts both the burdens of production and persuasion—the presumption itself would be unnecessary in light of §282’s additional statement as to the challenger’s burden. Pp. 5–13.
(b) Also rejected is Microsoft’s argument that a preponderance standard must at least apply where the evidence before the factfinder was not before the PTO during the examination process. It is true enough that, in these circumstances, “the rationale underlying the presumption—that the PTO, in its expertise, has approved the claim—seems much diminished,” KSR Int’l Co.
v. Teleflex Inc.
, 550 U. S. 398
, though other rationales may still animate the presumption. But the question remains whether Congress has specified the applicable standard of proof. As established here today, Congress did just that by codifying the common-law presumption of patent validity and, implicitly, the heightened standard of proof attached to it. The Court’s pre-Act cases never adopted or endorsed Microsoft’s fluctuating standard of proof. And they do not indicate, even in dicta, that anything less than a clear-and-convincing standard would ever apply to an invalidity defense. In fact, the Court indicated to the contrary. See RCA,
293 U. S., at 8. Finally, the Court often applied the heightened standard of proof without mentioning whether the relevant prior-art evidence had been before the PTO examiner, in circumstances strongly suggesting it had not. See, e.g.
, 301 U. S. 216
. Nothing in §282’s text suggests that Congress meant to depart from that understanding to enact a standard of proof that would rise and fall with the facts of each case. Indeed, had Congress intended to drop the heightened standard of proof where the evidence before the jury varied from that before the PTO, it presumably would have said so expressly. Those pre-Act cases where various Courts of Appeals observed that the presumption is weakened or dissipated where the evidence was never considered by the PTO should be read to reflect the commonsense principle that if the PTO did not have all material facts before it, its considered judgment may lose significant force. Cf. KSR
, 550 U. S., at 427. Consistent with that principle, a jury may be instructed to evaluate whether the evidence before it is materially new, and if so, to consider that fact when determining whether an invalidity defense has been proved by clear and convincing evidence. Pp. 14–18.
delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Scalia, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Alito,
filed a concurring opinion, in which Scalia
filed an opinion concurring in the judgment. Roberts, C. J.,