Court Opinion

ID: 9453225
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 18:07:29.770233+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:33.537411
License: Public Domain

SMITH, Judge
(concurring).
The majority opinion embraces a basis for its decision which seems to me to be too general. When read as broadly as it is written, the majority opinion seems to accept fully the proposition that a prior art patent can be relied upon to support a rejection for not only what it teaches or suggests to the art, but also for all that it enunciates concerning the prior state of the art. It is of common knowledge that statements in issued patents concerning the prior state of the art are in the nature of self-serving declarations. As such, these statements should only be relied upon subject to the reservations with which courts have treated self-serving declarations.
The probative value to be accorded to interpretations of the prior art contained in a reference patent depends first of all on the veracity and competency of the applicant and his attorney. Either or both may be mistaken about what the prior art, in fact, includes. Also, such interpretations must be evaluated for their factual worth by a standard of what the statements mean to one of ordinary skill in the art. We deal here with determining factual bases upon which legal conclusions are predicated. The test by which such statements of the prior art must be evaluated is to determine what the disclosure of the prior art would reasonably teach or suggest to one of ordinary skill in the art. See, e. g., In re Siebentritt, 372 F.2d 566, 54 CCPA 1083 (1967). To this extent, facts may be determined from the reference patent.
The establishment of the fact of what the prior art reveals must necessarily result from an inquiry made from the objective standpoint of the “reasonable man” of patent law, i. e., one of ordinary skill in the art. While no guarantee of the trustworthiness of the offered “evidence” is required, reasonable care must be exhibited to avoid inadvertently attributing more knowledge to the “prior art” than is, in reality, contained there.
The language of this court in In re Trbojevich, 361 F.2d 1013, 53 CCPA 1241 (1966), while arising from a somewhat different factual context, is believed to be appropriate:
When appellant’s argument is considered in the light of the issue here, its thrust is directed to the weight which should be accorded the teachings of British. Section 103 is not specific as to the weight to be accorded to a particular reference, but requires rather that we consider the totality of the teachings of the prior art to determine what would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of making the invention in issue.
In that case, this court considered that one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize certain challenged statements in a British patent as being valid teachings at the time the invention was made. We noted that the statements were credible information to be evaluated for their factual worth by one of ordinary skill in the art.
Here I agree with the result reached by the majority but only on the basis that when the statements in Poltorak are accepted and evaluated by what seems to me to be the proper standard, they are sufficient to have shifted to the appellants the burden of establishing facts to the contrary. I do not find that appellants have met this burden. They ap*990parently accepted, without challenge, that statement in Poltorak concerning the prior art which provides a strong base for the majority’s conclusion.
Thus, I would sharply limit the decision here to the failure of appellants’ proofs and not open the door to a general acceptance of the statements of the prior art as found in prior patents. Such statements should be considered only on the very limited and cautious basis here suggested.