Task: songer_typeiss

What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Your task is to determine the general category of issues discussed in the opinion of the court. Choose among the following categories. Criminal and prisioner petitions- includes appeals of conviction, petitions for post conviction relief, habeas corpus petitions, and other prisoner petitions which challenge the validity of the conviction or the sentence or the validity of continued confinement. Civil - Government - these will include appeals from administrative agencies (e.g., OSHA,FDA), the decisions of administrative law judges, or the decisions of independent regulatory agencies (e.g., NLRB, FCC,SEC). The focus in administrative law is usually on procedural principles that apply to administrative agencies as they affect private interests, primarily through rulemaking and adjudication. Tort actions against the government, including petitions by prisoners which challenge the conditions of their confinement or which seek damages for torts committed by prion officials or by police fit in this category. In addition, this category will include suits over taxes and claims for benefits from government. Diversity of Citizenship - civil cases involving disputes between citizens of different states (remember that businesses have state citizenship). These cases will always involve the application of state or local law. If the case is centrally concerned with the application or interpretation of federal law then it is not a diversity case. Civil Disputes - Private - includes all civil cases that do not fit in any of the above categories. The opposing litigants will be individuals, businesses or groups.

EDGERTON, Associate Justice.
This is a patent infringement suit. The District Court made full and specific findings of fact with respect to the prior art. .The correctness of those facts is not disputed. In our opinion they overcome the presumption in favor of the validity of an issued patent arid require the conclusion, -which the court reached, that the patent is invalid.
The alleged invention, Kelly patent No. 2,010,724, is a coupon book for use in in-stalment collections. Each coupon bears the names of all the months of the year, and also all numbers from 1 to 31. Each number occupies the same relative position on each coupon. The names of the months, on the other hand, are offset, so that where one coupon has “May” the next has “June.” It results that by punching the book only twice, once for the months and once for the days, one may indicate any given day, e. g., the 15th, in each of a series of months. The coupons are numbered serially for convenience in keeping track of payments made and to be made.
As the District Court found, the prior Davis patent, No. 1,114,342, discloses a multiple-payment coupon book containing a serially-numbered series of interest coupons. As in Kelly, months are offset while days are superimposed, in order to facilitate the punching of a series of dates. Differences such as Kelly’s use of a monthly succession of dates in place of Davis’s quarterly succession, and the absence in Kelly of Davis’s certificate of deposit, are not patentable. Davis and Kelly accomplished substantially the same thing in substantially the same way.
Affirmed.

Question: What is the general category of issues discussed in the opinion of the court?
A. criminal and prisoner petitions
B. civil - government
C. diversity of citizenship
D. civil - private
E. other, not applicable
F. not ascertained
Answer:

Answer: D