Funk Brothers Seed Co. v. Kalo Inoculant Co. (333 U.S. 127)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided February 16, 1948 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 333 U.S. 127 · 68 S. Ct. 440
- Docket
- No. 280
- Argued
- January 13, 1948
- Decided
- February 16, 1948
- Term
- October Term 1947
- Vote
- 7–2
- Majority author
- Justice Douglas
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Reversed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
How the Justices voted
- Majority
- Chief Justice Vinson, Justice Douglas (wrote), Justice Reed, Justice Black, Justice Rutledge, Justice Murphy
- Concurring in the judgment
- Justice Frankfurter (wrote)
- Dissenting
- Justice Burton (wrote), Justice R. H. Jackson
Opinion excerpt
Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. This is a patent infringement suit brought by respondent. The charge of infringement is limited to certain product claims of Patent No. 2,200,532 issued to Bond on May 14, 1940. Petitioner filed a counterclaim asking for a declaratory judgment that the entire patent be adjudged invalid. The District Court held the product claims invalid for want of invention and dismissed the complaint. It also dismissed the counterclaim. Both parties appealed. The Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the product claims were valid and infringed and that the counterclaim should not have been dismissed. 161 F. 2d 981. The question of validity is the only question presented by this petition for certiorari. Through some mysterious process leguminous plants are able to take nitrogen from the air and fix it in the plant for conversion to organic nitrogenous compounds. The ability of these plants to fix nitrogen from the air depends on the presence of bacteria of the genus Rhizo-bium which infect the roots of the plant and form nodules on them. These root-nodule bacteria of the genus Rhizobium fall into at least six species. No one species will infect the roots of all species of leguminous plants. But each will infect well-defined groups of those plants. Each species of root-nodule bacteria is made up of distinct strains which vary…
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