Baker v. Selden

Baker v. Selden
Docket number: 101 U.S. 99 (1880)
Term: 1879
Court: United States Supreme Court
Court membership
Chief Justice Morrison Waite • Joseph Bradley • Nathan Clifford • Stephen J. Field • John Marshall Harlan • Ward Hunt • Samuel F. Miller • Noah Swayne • William Strong

Baker v. Selden was decided on January 19, 1880, by the U.S. Supreme Court. The case is considered a seminal precedent in distinguishing intellectual property protections between those covered by patent and those covered by copyright.

Questions presented: "Whether the exclusive property in a system of book-keeping can be claimed, under the law or copyright, by means of a book in which that system is explained?"

Case background

In 1859, Charles Selden took steps to secure a copyright for a book he authored, Selden's Condensed Ledger, or Book-keeping Simplified. By 1865, Selden was serving as chief accountant to the Hamilton County treasurer. In May 1865, Selden signed a contract with the county for use of his bookkeeping system at a cost of $800 per year. He had hoped to adapt his system in order to secure a contract with the U.S. Department of the Treasury and had authorized the printing of numerous copies of his book, at his own expense, in advance of an order from the Treasury Department. Unfortunately for Selden, he was not able to modify his system to secure a contract with the Treasury Department.

In 1867, the auditor of Greene County, W.C.M. Baker, published his own book on a system of bookkeeping. Baker's system, which had similarities to Selden's, was endorsed by the state auditor of Ohio. By 1871, Baker had convinced 40 counties in Ohio and numerous private companies to adopt his system. That same year, Selden, in poor health and racked with debt, died. His widow, Elizabeth, was left destitute by 1872. Nevertheless, a complaint was filed in federal court by Samuel Fisher, on behalf of Selden, alleging that Baker infringed on Selden's copyright. Specifically, the complaint "charged Baker with substantially harming the market for Selden's work by pirating it and requested provisional and permanent injunctive relief against further publication and distribution of Baker's book."

In January 1875, district court judge Philip Swing held that Baker's books

“

...are, in large and material part identical with and infringements of the books of Selden system…, and especially in this, to wit, that the device, method and form of the defendant’s books for entering all the items of all monies received and disbursed, item by item, each item to its proper fund, are, as to the five left-hand columns employed by him, identical with and an infringement of the said Selden system; and that the device, method, and form of defendant’s said book for aggregating these items with previous balances to their respective funds, and so as to show the condition and balance to the debt and credit of each of these funds, are as to the column of funds, the two columns of brought forwards, the two columns of "totals," and the two columns of "balances," so far as these respect the funds, identical with and an infringement of the books of the said Selden system.

”

Based on these findings, Swing ordered that Baker was prohibited from any publication, sale, or other forms of distribution of his book in perpetuity. In March 1875, Baker filed an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Oral argument

Oral argument was conducted on December 2-3, 1879.

Decision

The judgment of the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of Ohio was reversed and remanded.

Opinion

The differences between the Selden and Baker systems

Justice Joseph Bradley delivered the opinion for a unanimous court. At the outset, Justice Bradley clearly identified the differences, as the court found them, between the Selden and the Baker systems:

“

The book or series of books of which the complainant claims the copyright consists of an introductory essay explaining the system of book-keeping referred to, to which are annexed certain forms or banks, consisting of ruled lines, and headings, illustrating the system and showing how it is to be used and carried out in practice. This system effects the same results as book-keeping by double entry; but, by a peculiar arrangement of columns and headings, presents the entire operation, of a day, a week, or a month, on a single page, or on two pages facing each other, in an account-book. The defendant uses a similar plan so far as results are concerned; but makes a different arrangement of the columns, and uses different headings.

”

Question presented

After explaining the specific differences between Baker's and Selden's bookkeeping systems, Justice Bradley framed the specific issues that would define the scope of inquiry for the case. Bradley stated that the court would need to consider whether or not the system that Selden explained in his book was a system to which he had the exclusive rights of use or whether the system Selden explained was open to public use. In Bradley's view, a violation of Selden's rights only occurred if Selden had the exclusive rights of use to his system; otherwise, Baker had merely explained a system of bookkeeping based, in part, on Selden's work. Regarding Selden's exclusivity claims, Bradley wrote,

“

It is contended that he has secured such exclusive right, because no one can use the system without using substantially the same ruled lines and headings which he was appended to his books in illustration of it. In other words, it is contended that the ruled lines and headings, given to illustrate the system, are a part of the book, and, as such, are secured by the copyright; and that no one can make or use similar ruled lines and headings, or ruled lines and headings made and arranged on substantially the same system, without violating the copyright ... Stated in another form, the question is, whether the exclusive property in a system of book-keeping can be claimed, under the law or copyright, by means of a book in which that system is explained?

”

Usage or expression?

Justice Bradley dismissed the idea that "the ruled lines of the complainant's account-book can be claimed under any special class of objects, other than books, named in the law of copyright..." Justice Bradley argued that although a book on bookkeeping may be very valuable in terms of the knowledge about bookkeeping that the book might convey, a copyrighted book describing a bookkeeping system would not, ipso facto, create a right to the exclusive usage of that system. In Bradley's words,

“

...there is a clear distinction between the book, as such, and the art which it is intended to illustrate. The mere statement of the proposition is so evident, that it requires hardly any argument to support it. The same distinction may be predicated of every other art as well as that of book-keeping. A treatise on the composition and use of medicines, be they old or new; on the construction and use of ploughs, or watches, or churns; or on the mixture and application of colors for painting or dyeing; or on the mode of drawing lines to produce the effect of perspective,- would be the subject of copyright; but no one would contend that the copyright of the treatise would give the exclusive right to the art or manufacture described therein. The copyright of the book, if not pirated from other works, would be valid without regard to the novelty, or want of novelty, of its subject-matter. The novelty of the art or thing described or explained has nothing to do with the validity of the copyright. To give to the author of the book an exclusive property in the art described therein, when no examination of its novelty has ever been officially made, would be a surprise and a fraud upon the public. That is the province of letters-patent, not of copyright. The claim to an invention or discovery of an art or manufacture must be subjected to the examination of the Patent Office before an exclusive right therein can be obtained; and it can only be secured by a patent from the government.

”

Patent v. copyright protection

Justice Bradley further developed his argument between patent and copyright protection in using a series of illustrations related to books about other fields of study. For example, a doctor who writes a book on a new type of medicine does not gain exclusive rights to the manufacture and sale of the medicine by virtue of his or her copyright; the rights to manufacture and sell the drug must come from a patent recognizing the physician's rights "for the mixture as a new art, manufacture, or composition of matter. He may copyright his book, if he pleases; but that only secures to him the exclusive right of printing and publishing his book."

Justice Bradley continued,

“

The very object of publishing a book on science or the useful arts is to communicate to the world the useful knowledge which it contains. But this object would be frustrated if the knowledge could not be used without incurring the guilt of piracy of the book ... the teachings of science and the rules and methods of useful art have their final end in application and use; and this application and use are what the public derive from the publication of a book which teaches them. But as embodied and taught in a literary composition or book, their essence consists only in their statement. This alone is what is secured by the copyright ... The use of the art is a totally different thing from a publication of the book explaining it ... The description of the art in a book, though entitled to the benefit of copyright, lays no foundation for an exclusive claim to the art itself. The object of the one is explanation; the object of the other is use. The former may be secured by copyright. The latter can only be secured, if it can be secured at all, by letters-patent.

”

Disposition

After a review of the relevant case law applied to Selden's claim, Justice Bradley concluded that "blank account-books are not the subject of copyright; and that the mere copyright of Selden's book did not confer upon him the exclusive right to make and use account-books, ruled and arranged as designated by him and described and illustrated in said book." As a result, the circuit court's ruling was reversed and the case was remanded with orders to dismiss Selden's claim.

Impact

Baker is among the most important and widely cited Supreme Court precedents on copyright. The principal holding of the case, that systems described in copyrighted works are not themselves protected by copyright, was codified into the Copyright Act of 1976, specifically in 17 U.S.C. §102(b):

“

In no case does copyright protection for an original work of authorship extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work.

”

Bernard Galler, author of a book on copyright and patent issues surrounding intellectual property protection for software developers and designers, wrote: "In each case of alleged copyright infringement there must be a determination of the idea or method, and the copyrighted expression. The 1879 case always referred to in such decisions is Baker v. Selden..."

See also

• Supreme Court of the United States
• History of the Supreme Court

External links

• Supreme Court of the United States