Horace Gray, Waterman v. Mackenzie — Opinion of the Court
“ A mortgage of real estate has gradually, partly by the adoption of rules of equity in courts of common law, and partly by express provisions of statute, come to be more and more considered as a mere security for the debt, creating a lien or incumbrance only, and leaving the title in the mortgagor, subject to alienation, levy on execution, dower, and other incidents of a legal estate ”
Horace Gray, Waterman v. Mackenzie — Opinion of the Court
“ Any assignment or transfer, short of one of these, is a mere license, giving the licensee no title in the patent, and no right to sue at law in his own name for an infringement. Id. § 4919; Gayler v. Wilder, 10 How. 477, 494, 495; Moore v. Marsh, 7 Wall. 515. In equity, as at law, when the transfer amounts to a license only, the title remains in the owner of the patent; and suit must be brought in his name, and never in the name of the licensee alone unless that is necessary to prevent an absolute failure of justice, as where the patentee is the infringer, and cannot sue himself. ”
Horace Gray, Waterman v. Mackenzie — Opinion of the Court
“ A patent-right is incorporeal property, not susceptible of actual delivery or possession; and the recording of a mortgage thereof in the patent-office, in accordance with the act of congress, is equivalent to a delivery of possession, and makes the title of the mortgagee complete towards all other persons, as well as against the mortgagor. The right conferred by letters patent for an invention is limited to a term of years, and a large part of its value consists in the profits derived from royalties and license fees. ”
