Court Opinion

ID: 9642236
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 17:52:48.827929+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:45.065229
License: Public Domain

BUFFINGTON, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
This controversy turns on certain basic facts. First, we are here dealing with a patented combination, to wit, a radio receiving set. That patented combination consists of two co-operating elements — first, a certain electrical mechanism; and, second, a radio tube. Standing alone and disassociated from this patented combination, every one is free to buy, sell, barter, and use a radio tube,' and such a commercial tube I herein style a "noneombination tube. ’’ With such ‘ ‘noneombination tube ’ ’ this ease has no concern. But when such "noneombination tube” is taken out of that free commercial field, and is associated in combination with the electrical mechanism in the patented combination here involved, it ceases to be the old "noneombi-nation tube” of unrestricted commerce, and becomes the "combination tube” of restricted patent use. To my mind much of the confusion in this case arises from regarding these "noneombination tubes” and the "combination tube” as one and the same thing. This leads to the divergent views of the plaintiff and defendant. For here comes the parting of the ways.
The plaintiff says: "Radio tubes, because old and an article of commerce, we have an unrestricted right to sell and use in any way, and the defendant prevents such unrestricted use and therefore suppresses competition.” On the other hand, the defendant says: "True, you have a right to sell and use a radio tube so long as it is a ‘noneombination tube,’ but when you combine your ‘noneombination tube’ with my electrical apparatus and thereby use your ‘noneombination tube’ in a field which did not exist in 'fact or commerce till my patent created such field, you have left the field of ‘noneombination tube’ commerce, and by a ‘combination tube’ use you have entered the field of a patent monopoly, the law gives me as a reward for my new, useful, and inventive combination use of the old, ‘noneombination tube’ of commerce.” Now, which of these contentions is the true view?
Turning to the facts of this ease, we have a patent for a radio receiving set which consists of a patent for a combination of a radio tube and certain electrical appliances, with the right to make and vend the patented combination. No one can deny to the patentee the right" to select the material or articles he shall assemble and use in the making of that article, and, having this unquestionable right of selection, he can exercise it by requiring his licensees, in making the patented article, to use such materials or articles as he selects. If the pat-entee does not work his patent and put his patented device on the market, no one could contend he was thereby restricting commerce, for there would be no commerce in his device to restrict. So, also, if in making such article for the market the patentee and his licensees determine what materials or articles should be used, how could such presale selection be regarded as a commercial restriction in the field of commerce be*263fore the patented combination was completed and, by subsequent sale, entered such field? There is here no tying up contracts, no restricted use, no replacement or royalty provisions, in fact, no conditions of any kind, by which the patentee seeks to dominate the patented article after it has by sale entered the field of commerce.
In the last analysis this ease turns on the purpose and meaning of the Clayton Act. Now it seems to me that such unreasonable tying up of patented articles after they had entered into the field of commerce, and thus extending the limited monopoly of a patent into the bridling of general commerce, was the mischief Congress had in view in passing -the Clayton Act, and it had no intent to strike down by implied repeal the well-known right of a patentee, and his assigns as well, to making his patented article of such material as he saw fit in pursuance of the broad provision of the patent law, viz.: “Every patent shall * * *' grant to the patentee, his heirs or assigns, for the term of 17 years, of the exclusive right to make * ‘J * the invention or discovery.” 35 USCA § 40. This right of the patentee to select his own materials was well considered and logically vindicated in Westinghouse Electric & Mfg. Co. v. Diamond State Fibre Co. (D. C.) 268 F. 126, where the right of the assignee of a patent for a car gear to contract with and require licensees to use certain materials furnished them by the owner of the patent; the court there saying:
• “The right to make the parts and material entering into the patented article, and to exclude others from making them, if such parts and material are unpatented as in this ease, would seem to be an inevitable adjunct of the patent and a part of the patent monopoly. There is no evidence in this case that the patentee or his assignee, the plaintiff, ever surrendered this monopoly to the public. I do not see, therefore, that the effect of granting a license to manufacture the Conrad gears, but reserving to the licensor the right to continue to make the gear material, was to surrender to the public the licensor’s monopoly to make the material entering into such gears, or to create a ‘line of commerce’ within the meaning of the Clayton Act.”
In addition to the foregoing, I am of opinion this contract should not have been set aside until all parties, to wit, part owners and licensees, were made parties and heard.