Campbell Metal Window Corporation v. S.H. Pomeroy & Co., Inc.
| Decision Date | 30 June 1924 |
| Citation | 300 F. 872 |
| Parties | CAMPBELL METAL WINDOW CORPORATION v. S. H. POMEROY & CO., Inc. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York |
Charles Neave and Alan N. Mann, both of New York City, for plaintiff.
William B. Greeley and William A. Redding, both of New York City, for defendant.
Verbally all the claims in suit cover the defendant's type A window, which is the only form here challenged. There is therefore, no need to invoke that doctrine, peculiar to the law of patents, by which the language of a formal written instrument is not taken as the limit of its scope, when the result would be to defeat the obvious purpose of the grant. The defendant, however, seeks to limit the generality of the words used by interpreting them upon the disclosure of the drawings and text, invoking in this respect an entirely legitimate canon of construction. The question which arises is, therefore, the familiar one of how far the disclosure may justly be generalized and the functional relation of the elements may be taken more abstractly than they are actually presented-- how far, in short, the invention must be compressed within the literal limits of the illustrations set forth.
In the earlier patent the specifications throughout describe a structure in which the plate attached to the sash is in contact with the rear wall of the jamb, and the capacious air spaces into which the leaks of air pass are those in which the counterweights move up and down. There is no suggestion of any more limited spaces, and the defendant insists that the claims must be confined to the disclosure. If so, the result is that the second patent is not a species of the first, or, as its specifications describe it, an improvement. I can see no reason for such a limitation. The purposes of the original patent are all realized, though the sash plate abuts upon a plate intermediate between the outer and inner face of the jamb. True, this reduces the cubic capacity of the air space, but it does not eliminate it, and, if experience proved that in practice a smaller space would serve, the invention was realized quite as much as though the disclosure has been literally followed.
In the Patent Office the applicant's solicitor in a brief distinguished Ruth's patent because his own disclosure passed through the metal of the jamb, the edge of the jamb not being formed by bending in the inner face. The dissenting opinion of the Examiner in Chief appears to have adopted the distinction, and this was the basis of the eventual allowance. But I cannot agree that the reasons given by either Examiner or applicant are to be incorporated by reference into the claims. Nor do I think that any such result follows from Goodyear, etc., Co. v. Davis, 102 U.S. 222, 26 L.Ed. 149. The court had there before it a claim which had been limited to hard rubber, and in confirmation of the natural meaning of the words did indeed notice certain corroborating language used by the applicant in the Patent Office proceedings. Mr. Justice Strong Expressly added that such language could not 'enlarge diminish, or vary' the patent. I do not understand that this case meant to require me to go through all that was said in the endless communications between applicant and Examiners to gather piecemeal the intent of the grant, as though I were construing a correspondence. If so, what is the purpose of the final formal instrument? The reference of the court to such confirmation of an otherwise clear meaning is not to be taken as establishing a general rule. In any event, it is well settled by authorities binding upon me that in this circuit we do not look to such exterior expression of intent but treat a patent as we should a will, a deed, or any other instrument intended to be a final memorial of the parties' intention. Westinghouse Elec. Co. v. Condit Elect. Co. (C.C.A. 2) 194 F. 427, 430, 114 C.C.A. 389; Auto Pneumatic Action Co. v. Kindley & Collins, 247 F. 323, 328, 159 C.C.A. 417; Spaulding & Bros. v Wanamaker (C.C.A. 2) 256 F. 530, 533, 534, 167 C.C.A. 602.
However this may be, the claims in any event took on a different meaning after the disclaimer. Without the added element that the sash plate shall touch a rear plate, it may be true that they could not be valid in the face of Keighley, unless it reached into the main space where the counterweight moved. When, however, the disclaimer added that element, I see no inconsistency in allowing to the words their natural meaning even though it be a different one from that which they must have had before. A disclaimer may...
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