Lytle v. Smith
| Decision Date | 25 October 1927 |
| Docket Number | 38268 |
| Citation | 215 N.W. 668,204 Iowa 619 |
| Parties | C. F. LYTLE, Appellant, v. MAX W. SMITH, Appellee |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from Woodbury District Court.--MILES W. NEWBY, Judge.
Plaintiff commenced action to enjoin defendant from engaging in unfair competition. For failure to obtain relief this appeal was taken.
Affirmed.
Edwin J. Stason, for appellant.
Brackney Farr & Stockman, for appellee.
This is an equity action, brought for the purpose of restraining the defendant, appellee, from transacting business under the firm name of Jasper Products Company, on the theory that such conduct amounted to unfair competition with the plaintiff, appellant, who was operating as the Jasper Stone Company. Decree in the district court was adverse to appellant's claim; hence this appeal.
Historically the facts are: C. F. Lytle, the appellant, became interested in the stone business at Jasper, Minnesota, in 1912, and afterward, in 1915, purchased a quarry known as the Jasper Stone Company quarry. Said stone was a pink quartzite, called by some, "Sioux Falls granite." During said time, there were other similar beds or mines at or near the same town. Appellant first prepared for sale a crushed stone, but in 1916, he commenced to make and place upon the market "grinding cubes and blocks" (used by cement mills, silica, and paint concerns). That last named product previously was cut in Germany, Belgium, and Norway, and from there shipped to America. The war, however, interrupted these foreign operations, and industries of the United States became interested in American production, resulting in orders therefor being supplied by appellant. In 1919, appellee was employed by said Lytle to assist in the management of the plant, and so continued until 1922, when, after a brief engagement in the oil business, he established for himself a new enterprise, under the designation above indicated, to wit, "Jasper Products Company," offering to the public stone goods specifically advertised as Jasper silica; while appellant continued to sell his wares by the trade style of "adamant silica." Foundation for this proceeding is based, not upon the right acquired by a trade name, but rather on the principle of "unfair trade." For years we have recognized the distinction. Sartor v. Schaden, 125 Iowa 696, 101 N.W. 511; Atlas Assur. Co. v. Atlas Ins. Co., 138 Iowa 228, 112 N.W. 232; Dyment v. Lewis, 144 Iowa 509, 123 N.W. 244; Iowa Auto Market v. Auto Market & Exch., 197 Iowa 420, 197 N.W. 321; Motor Accessories Mfg. Co. v. Marshalltown M. M. Mfg. Co., 167 Iowa 202, 149 N.W. 184. Such unfairness has two angles: one relating to deception in imitating the goods of another, so that the public will purchase the counterfeit, rather than the real, and the other has reference to a camouflage produced by transacting business under a similar name, and thereby causing the people to believe the substitute to be the original. Dyment v. Lewis, supra. Fundamentally, the property acquired in a business "trade name" need not be limited to the narrow margin permitting arbitrary acquisition of a trade-mark (Iowa Auto Market v. Auto Market & Exch., supra), but may be extended to the appropriation of descriptive terms or other words made personal by long use in connection with the goods or business of the particular owner, culminating in a "secondary right." Iowa Auto Market v. Auto Market & Exch., supra; Sartor v. Schaden, supra; Dyment v. Lewis, supra. No two cases are alike, and the criterion in each is: Does the resemblance mislead, or is it such as to deceive those who are acting with ordinary and reasonable caution? Iowa Auto Market v. Auto Market & Exch., supra, and kindred cases. There is no contention in the case at bar that the article offered for sale was objectionable because a "counterfeit or an imitation." Those grinding cubes and blocks were not peculiar to appellant's business, but were standard articles, manufactured in America and Europe. Our consideration, because of this, must be confined to a discussion of the likeness in "name." Parenthetically, it is well to note that the record fails to disclose appellee's borrowing or otherwise taking any name of a customer from appellant's mailing list. They were procured from directories. Although an effort was made to introduce some evidence, yet it was by no means established that a single customer dealt with appellee under the misapprehension that he was dealing with appellant. Only a few instances were shown in the record where...
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