Kane v. Huggins Cracker & Candy Co.

44 F. 287, 1890 U.S. App. LEXIS 1858
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the District of Western Missouri
DecidedDecember 11, 1890
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 44 F. 287 (Kane v. Huggins Cracker & Candy Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Western Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kane v. Huggins Cracker & Candy Co., 44 F. 287, 1890 U.S. App. LEXIS 1858 (circtwdmo 1890).

Opinion

Riiturs, J.

This is an application for injunction for the infringement of letters patent granted one Ceorgo i). Moffat of Chicago, Ill., assignor of Thomas Kane, letters .No. 356,894, dated January 18, 1887, entitled ‘‘Candy, and process of manufacturing the same.” The Huggins Cracker & Candy Company is a corporation of the state of Missouri, at Kansas City, Louis Huggins is a citizen of the state of Missouri, residing in this district, and the American Biscuit & Manufacturing Company is a corporation of the state of Illinois, at the city of Chicago. Where the patent is clear on its face, and its validity is not assailed aliunde, injunction is not only an appropriate, but may ho termed the natural, remedy for an infringement. Injunction is, however, an extraordinary remedy, and the discretion of the chancellor obtains in granting the writ in patent eases, as in other applications for injunction in equity. No further discussion of the merits of the patent in questiqn will be indulged than is deemed necessary to warrant the conclusion reached on this application for a temporary writ.

As to the Huggins Cracker & Candy Company the writ is refused, for the reason that I am satisfied, on the showing now made, that some three months prior to the filing of the bill herein this company sold and conveyed its stock, material, and plant to the American Biscuit & Manufacturing Company, since which time it has not employed the patented device in question. As the office of the writ is to restrain an existing [288]*288user, it will not be granted after the use has ceased. Brammer v. Jones, 3 Fish. Pat. Cas. 340. It is true the bill avers that this transfer was, and is simulated; that the Huggins Cracker & Candy Company but entered into what is, commonly known as a “trust,” retaining its corporate autonomy, still pursuing its customary business, with corporate responsibility, looking only to the success of the “combine” for its profits, and being subject to such compact. It is also true that some evidence of the continued business, eo nomine, by the Huggins Cracker & ‘Candy Company is presented by the use of the letter-heads of the company in certain correspondence of Louis Huggins, its former president. But the counter-affidavits so clearly show an absolute sale and transfer and the retirement from such business by the corporation, as such, that it would be unreasonable to hold that the complainant had made out a prevailing prima facie case sufficient to warrant a restraining order against the corporation. t

As to the respondent Louis Huggins, the facts disclosed are that he was the president of the Huggins Cracker & Candy Company, and, when the sale and transfer were made to the American Biscuit & Manufacturing Company, he was retained by the latter company merely in charge of the concern in Kansas City. At the time of filing the bill herein, he was only the employe of the American Biscuit & Manufacturing Company. Whatever he did in the matter of the imputed use of the patented device was for and on behalf of the latter corporation. In such case the injunction, if granted, should go against the corporation,, and not the servant; for if the corporation be enjoined, the servant’s occupation is gone.

The more important question is as to the right'of an injunction pen-dente lite against the American Biscuit & Manufacturing Company. The record proofs and the evidence aliimde leave it uncertain as to whether or not Moffat was the first discoverer of the alleged patented device, A patent was granted on the 23d day of December, 1884, No. 309,720, to William P. and James W. Kirchoff, for an improved process of, and apparatus for, the manufacture of candy. There was no contention at the hearing that this Kirchoff process is not substantially identical with the process claimed by the Moffat patent, and the proofs confirm this. It is true there was an interference contest had before the patent-office, at the instance of the complainant, prior to the grant of the Moffat patent, and that the Kirchoffs withdrew from the contention in favor of Moffat, and authorized the issue of the patent to him. But the fact remains that, while Moffat asserts that he was the discoverer of the claimed process and resultant product anterior to the Kirchoffs, and had so publicly proclaimed his discovery, and that the Kirchoffs simply took advantage of his pecuniary inability to prosecute his invention to patent, and availed themselves of the fact to intercept his application by filing an earlier caveat, yet the Kirchoffs make affidavit that they conceived the invention in November, 1875, and made an apparatus to carry out the process as early as May, 1882, and practically and publicly used the same in 1882, while Moffat claims to have made his discovery in October, 1881, and put it to prac[289]*289tical use in October, 1882. It also appears from the papers in the case that the complainant, Kane, paid the Kirohoiis §6,500 for their patent, about the time of their consent, filed in the patent-office, that the patent might issue to Moffat. It may be true, as asserted by complainant, that this 66,500 was paid by him solely by way of compromise, as the shortest road to peace, and the determination of a contest which could only postpone the realization of his expectations under a claim justly entitled to be protected by a patent. But as the matter stands, without more, there is grave misgiving as to the bona files of this transaction. Again, if, as a matter of fact, Moffat made his discovery, as now claimed by him, a serious question arises, whether or not he has not slept upon his conception so long before applying for a patent as to warrant the presumption of a dedication to the public use. If the Kirchoffs in taking-out their patent omitted to make claim of other devices of combination apparent on the face of their patent, which, as now claimed, were essential to its practical use and effect, the law presumes as to them that it was a dedication to the public use of f lie omitted matter, and they could make no subsequent claim {hereto, until they had, with all due diligence, surrendered tlieir patent for -reissue, and made proof that the omission arose wholly from inadvertence, accident, or mistake. Miller v. Brass Co., 104 U. S. 350. What is not claimed becomes public property. Mahn v. Harwood, 112 U. S. 354, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 174.

If, as a matter of fact, Moffat, living in the same town with the Kir-clioffs, knew, as he seems to have known, of the grant to them, and stood by for Iwo years without contest, now claims that the Kirchoffs appropriated his property in invention, is he in any better condition that would have been the Kirchoffs in laying claim to the omitted subjects? And will tbe law allow him, after such lapse of time, to obtain patent for tbe device known to him, and publicly put in use by the Kirchoffs and himself? 16 U. S. St. p. 201, § 24. Again, is not the Moffat patent invalid as to the third claim upon which relief in part is sought by ibis bill? His application was filed in 1886, and the patent was first issued in January, 1887.

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Bluebook (online)
44 F. 287, 1890 U.S. App. LEXIS 1858, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kane-v-huggins-cracker-candy-co-circtwdmo-1890.