Nulomoline Co. v. Dickinson
Nulomoline Co. v. Dickinson
Opinion of the Court
This petition grows out of the decision in Nulomoline Co. v. Stromeyer (C. C. A. 3) 249 Fed. 597, -C. C. A.-. After that decision a decree was entered by the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania that was intended to carry out our directions, and no complaint is made of its provisions, except in one particular. The company asked, and the District Court refused, the insertion of the following paragraph:
“The said Julius Stromeyer is enjoined and restrained from at any time hereafter selling any products of invert sugar, manufactured in any manner or by any formulas whatsoever, whether those of the said Julius Stromeyer, or those used by the plaintiff company, or otherwise, to any customers previously the customers of the plaintiff company, whose names were disclosed to the said Julius Stromeyer by the said Maxwell Tausefc, the plaintiff’s former employé. * * * ”
The present petition asks us to direct the court below to adopt the foregoing paragraph, or its equivalent. The company insists, that as Stromeyer, by his unlawful conduct with Tausek, has taken away certain of the company’s former customers, he should be wholly and forever prevented from selling to these customers any invert sugar, no matter how, or when, or by whom, such sugar might be manufactured. In our opinion the authorities to which we have been referred (Witkop Co. v. Boyce, 61 Misc. Rep. 126, 112 N. Y. Supp. 874; s. c., 64 Misc. Rep. 374, 118 N. Y. Supp. 461; Witkop Co. v. Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co., 69 Misc. Rep. 90, 124 N. Y. Supp. 956; People’s Coat Co. v. Light, 171 App. Div. 671, 157 N. Y. Supp. 15; Vulcan Co. v. American Can Co., 72 N. J. Eq. 387, 67 Atl. 339, 12 L. R. A. [N. S.] 102; Stevens v. Stiles, 29 R. I. 399, 71 Atl. 802, 20 L. R. A. [N. S.] 933, 17 Ann. Cas. 140; Empire Laundry Co. v. Lozier, 165 Cal. 95, 130 Pac. 1180, 44 L. R. A. [N. S.] 1159, Ann. Cas. 1914C, 628; Grand Union Tea Co. v. Dodds, 164 Mich. 50, 128 N. W. 1090, 31 L. R. A. [N. S.] 260), do not go as far as this, and we do not think the principles that underlie them support the petition.
The theory of the hill is that the company’s secret process produces a kind of invert sugar so characteristic and so marked as to be superior to the product of its competitors. Nulomoline, although belonging to the class of invert sugars, is said to stand apart, and therefore a customer that orders it does not receive what he wants, if he is given another invert sugar. The gravamen of the charge is that Stromeyer unfairly obtained knowledge of the company’s process, made Nulo-moline thereby, and sold it at a lower price to certain consumers, who
The proposed paragraph is too sweeping, and the District Judge was right in refusing to adopt it.
The petition is therefore refused.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- NULOMOLINE CO. v. DICKINSON, District Judge
- Status
- Published