Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/153

 14:6 FEDERAL REPORTER. �500 pounds per day, on 60 days' notice, yet the defendant, disregarding the rights of the plaintiffs, refuse to deliver to the plaintiffs any celluloid, though often req[uested so to do, acoording to the terms of the said lioense, and in quantities les8 than 100 pounds per day, and have revoked, or pretended to revoke, said license, and have granted another lioense for the same thing, covering the same territory as the license herein described and set forth, to other persons, who have established a large and profitable business thereunder, and have deprived plaintiffs of the use of the said license for a long time, to-wit, from the time of granting the same to the end and term of the patents under which the same was granted; that previous to the refusai of the defendant cor- poration to fumish to the plaintiffs celluloid as therein set forth, the said George M. Drake, Samuel Coursen, Jr., and Martin M. Drake surrendered ail their right, title, and interest to and in the said license to the defendant ; that the defendant accepted the surrender, whereby the plaintiffs became the sole o-vmers thereof ; and that Jacob H. Theberath has, be- fore the commencement of this suit, transferred and aasigned ail his right and interest to and in the same to the said Charles M. Theberath, whereby the said Charles has become and now is the sole owner thereof. �The issue raised by the demurrer tums upon the question whether the contract on -which the suit is brought is joint or several. The counsel for the demurrants insists that it is a license, authorizing the licensees jointly to use the patented article in the manner and upon the terms speoified in the agreement, and that no action is maintainable thereon by any number of the licensees less than the -whole number. The counsel for the plaintiffs, on the other hand, oontends that the contract is, in fact, an assignment of a portion of the patent to grantees; that the several owners of a patent are not part- ners, but tenants in common, and that each part owner has the right to order and use the patented article without the con- sent of the other, and hence that the grantor is severally liable to each one of the grantees for the breaoh of the cove- nants of the agreement. ����