INTERFERENCE

In patent law, this term designates a collision between rightB claimed or granted; that 'is, where a person claims a patent for the whole or any integral part of the ground already covered by an ex-. isting patent or by a pending application. Mllton v. Kingsley, 7 App. D. C. 540; Dederick v. Fox (C. C.) 56 Fed. 717; Nathan Mfg. Co. v. Craig (0. C.) 49 Fed. 370. Strictly speaking, an "interference" is declared to exist by the patent office whenever it is decided by the properly constituted authority in that bureau that two pending applications (or a patent and a pending application), in their claims or e ence, cover the same discovery or invention, so as to render nece ary an investigation into the question of priority of invention between the two applications or the application and the patent, as the case may be. Lowrey v. Cowles Electric Smelting, etc., Co. (C. n) 68 Fed. 372. [s. 653]