1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



350 



REPLY TO ATTORNEY WILLIAMSON. 



Infringement, oi- desire to infringe, are, eitlier or botli, 

 prinia-fac'ie evidence of utility.— Walker. 



Bro. Rout :—l Ivavo lliis day discovored Mr. Daii- 

 zetibaker's attorney Willi.inison s silteDipted defense 

 of his client's infrinjiinsr hive (not pa;tent), in your 

 Tradf N(jtes in April Ist Gleanings. While I re>fret 

 that you should have printed such a communica- 

 tion, and al.so that two weeks should elapse before 

 the sopliislry could be shown up, I am pleased at 

 your editorial remark that " both sides sliall have a 

 fair and impartial liearing-." 



Mr. Williamson is in the position of a paid attor- 

 ney, and we all know what that means. It is no 

 reflection upon the gentleman's character, to infer 

 that he deems it a moral duty to carry the point 

 desired by his client, rig-ht or wrong-. Now, Mr. 

 Williamson is discussing- a subject before an audi- 

 ence of bee-keepers, not one in tifty of whom have 

 sufHcient knowledge of the same not to be misled. 

 The members of this audience have been compelled 

 to devote their time and intelligence to other mat- 

 ters; but these other matters have cultivated their 

 inherent logic; consequently, it is more in this line 

 than strictly in the line of patent law that I shall 

 reply to the learned attorney. My own knowledge 

 of patent law enables me to answer definitely and 

 successfully every point raised by Mr. W. ; and, in 

 fact, my article preceding it, and the paragraphs 

 from Walker's Patent Law, found in my 1890 circu- 

 lar, do most completely answer every point that he 

 brings up; and these I commend to those of your 

 readers who may understand patent law as well as 

 or better than I do myself; but this article I shall 

 contine principally to the illogical position of Mr. 

 Danzenbaker and his attorney, believing it will be 

 the better understood by our just and logical bee- 

 keepers. 



Allow me to call the reader's attention to the fact 

 that Mr. Williamson makes no mention of patent 

 law in equity. He speaks of my natural or "moral 

 rights" as though he had seen a proof of my fore- 

 going article, jf Mr. Williamson is given room for 

 another article, T request you to mail me proof at 

 once, when I will have my Washington attorney 

 append a reply to the same, which will unquestion- 

 ably end all discussion on the legal aspect of my 

 right to my earnings as an apicultural inventor. 

 No one knows the state of the art so well as bee- 

 keepers; such students of our literature as Prof. 

 Cook, Hutchinson, Clark, Mason (and, without tak- 

 ing further space, twenty other prominent bee- 

 keepers), would never have proclaimed "new, orig- 

 inal, unexcelled, a revolution," etc., were I now the 

 owner of nothing- of any value. If such could be 

 true, of what use is our patent office ? and of what 

 service are our patent-solicitors? Such would be 

 an everlasting stain upon Mr. Williamson's pro- 

 fession. My attorneys will undoubtedlj' be as 

 anxious to defend the title to my property, a docu- 

 ment of their creation, as Mr. Williamson is anxious 

 to tear it down, as a paid attorney in the interest of 

 Mr. Danzenbaker. They will undoubtedly be able 

 to defend the right, especially as "possession is nine 

 points in law." The misleading arguments of Mr. 

 Williamson, made for the purpose of dispossessing 

 me of my earnings, by claiming that there is a Haw 

 in my title to the same, are an exact repetition of 

 the Langstroth history; of the attack upon the nat- 

 ural rights of the man we have subsequently saint- 

 ed as the bee-keepers' greate-st benefactor. If it 

 were true, that any of the features of the Danzen- 

 baker hive, which belong to Mr. D. (claimed in his 

 patent), were of any value, Mr. Williamson's line of 

 argument would as completely rob Mr. D nzenba- 

 ker, could it be successfull.y carried out in ihe prac- 

 tice of bee-keepers, as it is intended to rob me. 



I call your readers' attentiiiu to mi-staki's, both in 

 statements and deductions, in Mr Williamson's 

 article, as follows: He says the two hives are similar 

 in construction, (jitly in the matter of divisible 

 brood-chambers and top covers. That is not true. 

 If Mr. W. knew aught of the state of our art, he 

 never would have mentioned "top covers," and, 

 further, would have known that the close-fitting 

 frames, at the same time closely fitting the case, 

 prior with me, was the second essential feature of 

 my hive, and imitated b.y Mr. Danzenbaker. He 

 asks if my pitent contains any claim which by a 

 "fair construction" can be held to lie infringed by 

 the D. hive. ''Fair construction!" Here Mr. W. 

 admits that paient courts take into consideration 

 the matter of " fairness" in construing the breadth 

 of a patent-claim, and by this bee-keepers may know 



just where our suit at law will come out at the end 

 of a damag'e-suit against Mr. Danzenbaker's cus- 

 tomers. Of course, Mr. Willldmson must say some- 

 thing, because he is paid for so doing. The above 

 shows clearly that Mr. W.'s statement, that claim 

 five of my patent is the only one that touches upon 

 the features of construction common to the two 

 hives, is a gross erroi'. 



Next, Mr. \V. quotes a claim of my original appli- 

 cation wliich was rejected by the patent office, but 

 fails to infcnm your readers that it is whoU.y cover- 

 ed by the last eight words of claim five, which read: 

 "substantially as, and for the purposes set forth." 

 In answer to another misleading statement of Mr. 

 D.'s attorney, let me explain that I never claimed 

 to be the prior inventor of every kind of brood- 

 chamber which could be divided "fir the purpose 

 of increasing or diminishing its capacity." I so 

 stated in the discussion which arose relative to the 

 Ekes and Nadirs of Fiance and Germany. My claim 

 is on a divisible brood-chamber containing frames; 

 one capable of the manipulations of modern apicul- 

 ture, for the purposes set forth in my specifications. 

 What are these purposes? Not only to " contract 

 or enlarge" the brood-chamber, but to alternate its 

 upper and lower parts, to produce certain results in 

 the surplus sections of the hive. Now let me quote 

 to you from the great authority. Walker: 



"Novelty of a thing is not negatived by any other 

 thing fundamentally incapable of the functions of 

 the first." 



" Novelty and patentability are not negatived by 

 the fact that every part of the thing is old." 



"Novelty of any thing is not negatived by another 

 thing which was not dexigned or used to perform the 

 functions of the first." 



The above is a complete answer to Mr. W.'s mis- 

 leading quibble regarding the revision of my claims, 

 made to suit the Patent Office, and still holds as 

 much as before. 



Now, Bro. K')()t, you say that you have .sent for 

 the tliree copies of old patents my attorney was 

 cited to, as referred to by Mr. Williamson. Why, 

 bless your soul, 23 citations were handed out by the 

 examiners, and yet only three or four of them con- 

 tained a single feature in any way resembling any 

 part of my hive, and these were nothing fatal to 

 the value of my patent. Firing at us irrelevant 

 citations is a privilege of the examiners. These 32 

 copies I lost in the fire in Patent- Attorney R. B. 

 Wheeler's office in Detroit, about four years ago. I 

 have never replaced them, because they have no 

 bearing against the title to my property, when 

 lightly understood. I will ask one question, which, 

 if bee-keepers can not answer in the affirmative, 

 the argument based upon these citations falls to the 

 ground. Are you willing to, and do you expect to 

 use. the features and functions shown in these old 

 patents, as and for the purposes therein specified ? If 

 not, what do you propose to do ? What is it that is 

 just now so greatly desired ? Fill Gleanings from 

 cover to cover with nothing but .sophistical, mis- 

 leading, and confusing discussions b.v patent-law- 

 yers, and, in the end, down in the hearts of all 

 honest bee-keepers will remain this verdict: "To 

 Heddon belongs the practical, divisible brood- 

 chamber, with its reversible cases and close-fitting 

 frames closely fitting the case, as and for the pur- 

 poses specified in his patent, and further explained 

 in his book, Success in Bee Culture." 



To close, I will say that I notice your statement, 

 that you "take ni> side in the matter." I believe 

 you should, and believe j'ou will — not with persons, 

 but with principles. I know that you know the 

 property to be mine, all the time you are discussing 

 the question of the technically legal title to the 

 same; and I think it strange that, in your last J^sue, 

 you confine yourself wholly to the matter or title, 

 utterly ignoring the question of right per se. It 

 seems to me that this is almost the only point the 

 mass of your readers can understandingly decide 

 upon, and upon that I know they are already decid- 

 ed. However, if you wish to educate us all in the 

 details of patent law I will not be displeased, and 

 my attorneys will be on hand promptly. 



It seems to me that the matter stands about like 

 this: Mr. Martin has voiced the sentiments of nearly 

 all of our bee-keepers in proclaiming the fact that 

 Mr. Danzenbaker's hive is a " gross infringement" 

 on my invention. No one has ever claimed that I 

 have infringed a ny man's rights. Nine years elaps- 

 ed before any such claims as attorney Williamson's 

 were made, because it required that length of time • 

 for Mr. Danzenbaker to discover the value of my 

 inv^ention. Why does not Mr. D. apply ?i is patent- 



