Opinion ID: 1543578
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: On Reargument.

Text: Upon petition of the appellees a rehearing was granted as to whether the six months' period of limitation for suit under R. S. § 4915 as amended, 35 U.S.C.A. § 63, started to run from May 3, 1937, when the commissioner of patents, acting through the primary examiner, gave notice to Tanner that his claims in issue in the interference stand finally rejected, or from February 27, 1937, when the Board of Appeals affirmed the decision of the examiner of interferences awarding priority of invention to Curtin and Kline. The additional briefs and arguments have confirmed us in our opinion that May 3rd was the critical date. The inference drawn from the express words of the statute finds further support in Rule 132 of the Patent Office, which provides: Whenever an award of priority has been rendered in an interference proceeding by any tribunal and the limit of appeal from such decision has expired,    the primary examiner shall advise the defeated party or unsuccessful party or parties to the interference that their claim or claims which were so involved in the issue stand finally rejected. No importance can be attached to the fact that the rule employs the phrase stand finally rejected rather than are finally rejected. When the commissioner, acting through the examiner, advises the applicant that his claims stand finally rejected, he then, for the first time, refuses the patent for such claims. Moreover, Patent Office Rule 141 requires that after a decision by an appellate tribunal, the case shall be remanded to the primary examiner, subject to the applicant's right of appeal, for such action as will carry into effect the decision, or for such further action as the applicant is entitled to demand. Even after the Board of Appeals has awarded priority to one of the interferants, the commissioner may nevertheless issue a patent to the defeated party, if the successful interferant abandons his application without making the invention public. See Jolliffe v. Waldo, 1917 C.D. 15; Fanslow v. Whitney, 1919 C.D. 93; Nash v. Reeder, 1920 C.D. 72. Compare Milburn Co. v. Davis-Bournonville Co., 270 U.S. 390, at page 400, 46 S.Ct. 324, 70 L. Ed. 651, to the effect that abandoned applications are not prior art. Neither party can find authoritative support for his contention in the decisions of the courts. Cases such as McKnight v. Metal Volatilization Co., C.C., 128 F. 51, are not persuasive, since they arose prior to the 1927 amendment to R.S. § 4915, 35 U.S.C.A. § 63. No case subsequent to the amendment involves a direct holding on the point. Two text writers state the rule in favor of the appellees, but they appear to base it upon the McKnight case and a dictum of this court in Syracuse Washing Mach. Co. v. Vieau, 2 Cir., 72 F.2d 410. See Stringham, Patent Interference Equity Suits, § 7962; 2 Walker, Patents, 1937 Ed., pp. 968, 969. The point was not argued in the Vieau case and we must retract the dictum contained in that opinion; against it the appellants set off contrary dicta in Synthetic Plastics Co. v. Ellis-Foster Co., 3 Cir., 78 F.2d 847, 848, and Wettlaufer v. Robins, 2 Cir., 92 F.2d 573, 576. In the absence of controlling case law, our decision must be guided by the natural meaning of the words of the statute and the practice of the Patent Office which is in harmony with such meaning. We therefore adhere to our former decision.