William Howard Taft

“ No formal granting of a license is necessary in order to give it effect. Any language used by the owner of the patent or any conduct on his part exhibited to another, from which that other may properly infer that the owner consents to his use of the patent in making or using it, or selling it, upon which the other acts, constitutes a license, and a defense to an action for a tort. Whether this constitutes a gratuitous license, or one for a reasonable compensation, must, of course, depend upon the circumstances ”

“ The sole question, therefore, which the Court of Claims considered and decided against the appellant was whether, on the facts recited in the petition, the American Telephone & Telegraph Company had in fact given a license to the United States to have made and use these audions covered by the patents. In other words, was the claim which the American Telephone & Telegraph Company had against the United States, for the manufacture and use of the audions, based on a contract, or was it based on a tort? ”