Haskell v. Jones

• Decision Date: 25 February 1878
• Citation: 86 Pa. 173
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court
• Parties: Haskell <I>et al. versus</I> Jones.

86 Pa. 173

Haskell et al. versus Jones.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

January 28, 1878.

February 25, 1878.

January 28th 1878.

Before AGNEW C. J., SHARSWOOD, MERCUR, GORDON, PAXSON, WOODWARD and TRUNKEY, JJ.

Error to the Court of Common Pleas, No. 1, of Philadelphia county: Of January Term 1878, No. 73½.

Lewis Waln Smith, for plaintiffs in error.—The Act of 12th April 1872 is in conflict with the eighth section, article 1, of the Constitution of the United States. Powers conferred on Congress under the Constitution are thereby exclusively vested in Congress, and, consequently, forbidden to the states: Brown v. State of Maryland, 12 Wheat. 419; Willson v. The Blackbird Creek Co., 2 Peters 245; Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1; New York v. Miln, 11 Peters 102; Passenger Cases, 7 Howard 203; Cooley v. Board of Wardens, 12 Id. 311; Gilman v. Philadelphia, 3 Wall. 713; State Taxes Cases, 15 Id. 232, 284 and 300.

The power is given to Congress to grant patents, and the Act of 1872, when it undertakes to prescribe how a patent can be used, sold or vended, and takes away from notes given for a patent right their negotiability under the law of commerce, and provides severe penalties for any patentee who shall venture to take a negotiable promissory note as part of the price of his patent, interferes with this power.

Laws identical in purpose, and almost identical in words, were passed not only by Pennsylvania, but also by Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Minnesota; and except Pennsylvania in all of those states have been declared unconstitutional and void: Woollen v. Banker (Ohio), Am. L. Rec. 1877, 236; Ex parte Robinson, 2 Bissell 311; Cranson v. Smith (Mich.) Albany Law Jour. 1877, 330; Crittenden v. White (Minn.) 9 Chicago Leg. News 112; Patterson v. Commonwealth, 11 Bush. 311. In this case the note in question does not fall within the law. The negotiable character of the instrument is only taken away when the words "given for a patent right" are written or printed on its face. An innocent purchaser for value cannot be affected by the act.

Edwin S. Dixon, for defendant in error.—The fallacy of the argument of the plaintiff in error consists in his treating the Act of 1872 as undertaking to prescribe how a patent can be used or sold, when it simply regulates, as the title implies, the execution and transfer of notes given for patent rights. The acts of other states upon which the rulings in the cases cited by plaintiff in error are based, are plainly distinguishable from our act.

Mr. Justice SHARSWOOD delivered the opinion of the court, February 25th 1878.

If the act entitled "An Act to regulate the execution and transfer of notes given for patent rights," passed April 12th 1872, Pamph. L. 60, makes absolutely void all such notes in which the words "given for a patent right" are not prominently and legibly written or printed on the face of such note above the signature thereto, there would be great reason for the contention that the act is unconstitutional and void. No state can so interfere with the right of a patentee, secured to him by the Acts of Congress, to sell and assign his patent. But such is not the operation of the act, according to its letter and spirit. By the express provision of the statute, the only effect of the insertion of such words is that "such note or instrument in the hands of the purchaser or holder shall be subject to the same defences as if in the hands of the...