OCR Text |
Show FAMOUS LITIGATION W BE REOPENED The United States supreme court has before it the petition of the Minerals Separation North American corporation for a writ of certiorari in its case against the Butte & Superior Mining company. Before the end of this month a decision should be made as to whether the court will permit a reopening of the case. Upon this decision will depend the operation oper-ation of flotation patents controlled by the Minerals Separation company. Foremost is the restrictions as to the amount of oil used. Should the supreme court refuse the writ it would mean that mining companies including Anaconda and other Montana properties would be at liberty to use oil in flotation in any amount exceeding one-half one-half of - one per cent to the ton of ore or ten pounds, without infringement of Minerals Separation patents. For a time Butte & Superior used less than this quantity of oil and admittedly infringed the patents in question. This" matter has yet to be adjusted. Today, however, under a ruling of the United States circuit court of appeals in San Francisco, which was issued, as an interpretation in-terpretation of the United States supreme court decision, Butte & Superior and any other company may use ten pounds or more of oil without violation of patent. Anaconda has a contract with Minerals ! Separation under which it pays royalty of j 4 cents per ton of material treated, the ! lowest rate granted any mining company j except those others included in the blanket blan-ket arrangement entered into by Anaconda Anacon-da with the Minerals Separation company com-pany several years ago. If the supreme court decides to grant the writ of certiorari it might result in upholding the Minerals Separation contention con-tention that anything up to one per cent of oil. or 20 pounds, used in flotation constitutes con-stitutes infringement. Minerals Separation has been constantly adding to its list of clients and issuing licenses for the use of its process of ore i concentration. A few of the larger min-ing min-ing companies have not contracted, OOtably the JackHng group of porphyries j and the Miami Copper company. Boston ; News Bureau. |