Keystone Manufacturing Co. v. Adams

Citations

• 151 U.S. 139
• 14 S. Ct. 295
• 38 L. Ed. 103
• 1894 U.S. LEXIS 2042

Syllabus

<p>The invention patented to.Henry A. Adams by letters patent No. 132,128, dated October 15, 1872, for a new and useful improvement in corn-shellers, is a substantial and meritorious one, well worthy of a patent, and is infringed by machines manufactured under sundry letters patent granted to Harvey Packer.</p> <p>IVhen, in a class of machines widely used, it is made to appear that, after •repeated and futile attempts, a machine has been contrived which accomplishes tlie result desired, and a patent is granted to the inventor, the courts will not adopt a narrow construction, fatal to the grant.</p> <p>While it is undoubtedly established law that complainants in patent cases may give evidence- tending to show the profits realized by defendants from use of the patented devices, and thus enable the courts to assess the amounts which the • complainants are entitled to recover, yet it is also true that great difficulty has always been found, in the adjudicated cases, in applying the rule that the profits of the defendant afford a standard whereby to estimate the amount which the plaintiff is entitled to recover, and in defining the extent and limitations to which this rule is admittedly subject.</p> <p>Such a measure of damages is of comparatively easy application where the entire machine used or sold is the result of the plaintiff’s invention; but when, as in the present case, the patented invention is but one feature in a machine embracing other devices that contribute to the profits made by the defendant, serious difficulties arise.</p> <p>The record shows that the complainant did not seek to recover a license fee, nor did he offer any evidence from which his damages could be coim puted. He relied entirely on the proposition that the amount which he was entitled to recover could be based on the profits realized by the defendant from the sale of the patented invention, and the amount of such profits he claimed to have shown by evidence tending to show what certain thir