Court Opinion

ID: 9458710
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 21:00:00.235709+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:35:52.247950
License: Public Domain

McALLISTER, Senior Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from the opinion of the Court for the reason that I am of the view that the decision of the District Court on the issue of validity should be affirmed.
The basis of this Court’s opinion is that under the language of the third paragraph of 35 U.S.C.A., Sec. 112, the rule as stated in Kalle & Co. v. Multazo Co., 109 F.2d 321, 325 (C.A.6), is not applicable to the claim in issue.
In Kalle, the Court held:
“Where within a general classification disclosed by the claims, are compounds which do not answer the description of the specification, even though there be a general quality common to them all, yet if there be no common quality in respect to their effectiveness in achieving the inventive concept, claims for their exclusive use cannot be sustained.”
Under the Kalle rule, the holding of the District Court that the claim in issue was invalid, it is agreed, should be sustained. However, under the prevailing opinion of this Court it is said that the Kalle ease predated the enactment of the third paragraph of 35 U.S.C.A., Sec. 112, which provides:
“An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.”
It is the foregoing paragraph of the statute that the majority opinion holds modified the rule in the Kalle case and that, accordingly, the District Court’s holding that the claim in question is invalid, should be reversed.
The above section of the statute was never thought of by plaintiffs-appellants as being a ground for reversal of the District Court’s holding of invalidity. It was never considered in their brief on appeal; and it was only after the ease was argued and our Court asked for their views on this heretofore-unmentioned question that appellants, for the *304first time, relied upon the third paragraph of 35 U.S.C.A., Sec. 112, for reversal of the judgment of the District Court.
I cannot bring myself to agree with the contentions now made by plaintiffs-appellants, and with the conclusions of the Court in this regard. Rather, I am of the view that the judgment of the District Court should be affirmed.
It appears to me that whether claims are drawn in the form prescribed by the third paragraph of 35 U.S.C.A., Sec. 112, or whether they are drawn in another form, they are equally subject to invalidation for overclaiming.
To adopt, in part, the language of Judge Simons in Kalle & Co. v. Multazo & Co., supra, “[o]ut of a maze of confusing scientific discussion in briefs and record, there yet emerges with reasonable clarity to the understanding imperfectly schooled in chemical science,” the fact that the patent in question is invalid for claiming inoperable compounds.
There was evidence, introduced by defendant, that the claim in question covered thousands, or possibly hundreds of thousands, of compounds; and defendant further produced evidence that the ten compounds, embraced in the claim, which it tested, were not effective for the purpose set forth. At the trial there was evidence that several other compounds, embraced in the claim, had been proven effective. The District Court held that there was ample evidence that the compounds of copper methyl arsonate and phenyl mercury methyl arsonate were not effective, although these compounds were embraced within the claim in issue; and the Court, accordingly, held that the claim was invalid. Under the prior decisions of this Court, Kalle v. Multazo, supra; Libby-Owens-Ford Glass Co. v. Celanese Corporation of America, 135 F.2d 138, and Patrol Valve Co. v. Robertshaw-Fulton Controls Co., 210 F.2d 146, it is my view that the claim in issue is invalid, and that the judgment of the District Court should be affirmed for the reasons set forth in the opinion of Judge Kinneary.