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The Green Bag
play have the right to give his play the name of the novel on which it was based, particu larly if each made proper public announce ment that he was the author of that play? "The rule is well settled that, on the ex piration of a patent for an article which has become identified by some particular name, as the name of the inventor, although it is open to the public to manufacture the patented article and to call it by the name by which it is commonly known, it is unfair competition to do so unless the person making the article afiixes to it a plain notice that it is not made by the owner of the original patent, but by some one else (Singer Mfg. Co. v. June Mfg. Co., 163 U. S. 169; Merriam
Interstate Commerce.
Railway Terminals
a Link in Chain of Interstate Transportation and Subject to Control of Interstate Commerce Commission— Hepburn Act. U. S. The United States Circuit Court for the southern district of Texas has lately aflirmed the ruling of the Interstate Commerce Com mission that the terminals of interstate common carriers are within the jurisdiction
of the Commission. The decision was rendered in the case of Southern Pacific R. Co. v. Eichenberg, Judges McCormick and Shelby supporting the Commission and Judge Pardee dissenting. The case now goes to the United States Supreme Court for review. The Commission had held that, as the
v. Famous Shoe, etc., Co., 47 Fed. 411).
The
same rule has been applied to copyrights (ll/lerriam Co. v. Ogilvie, 159 Fed. 638).
But
in this case. upon all the advertisements and notice of their play put out by the defendants, they publish the fact that it was written by Neil Twomey, and I think that the proof shows that, if the principle announced in the
case of the Singer Mfg. Co. v. is applicable to the case of a rule there laid down has been by the defendants." A preliminary injunction denied. See Unfair Competition.
june Mfg. Co. copyright, the complied with was therefore I
Insurance. Direct Loss by Fire—Damage by Smoke from xldismanaged Furnace In cluded. Wis. In O'Connor v. Queens Insurance Co., decided by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin,
reported in 122 N. W. Rep. 1038, it appeared that the servant made a fire in the furnace out of soft coal and wood, which burned so
freely that an excessive amount of heat and smoke escaped through the registers and in jured the house and furniture. There was no ignition outside of the furnace, but this
was nevertheless held to be a fire covered by a policy of insurance against direct loss by fire. This seems to be directly contra to the generally accepted notion; see Richards on Insurance, 3d edition at page 284. It is, however, approved by the Columbia Law Review, discussing the case in its January issue (10 Cal. L. Rev. 58-60), as a proper
application of a liberal rule which it advocates: “To say the parties intended no recovery for such a loss because the fire was never where not intended to be would seem to give undue force to a mere technicality."
railroad and steamship lines at Galveston were in one control, and as the terminal company was organized to furnish terminal facilities for the Southern Pacific at Galveston, it formed a. necessary link in the chain of interstate commerce and was subject to the Hepburn act. The Court sustained this finding. Landlord and Tenant. Apartment House Leases to Families with Children-Right of the State to Safeguard Interests of Society by Compelling Such Leases. Ill. The decision of a lower court in Illinois, denying the right of landlords to exclude children from apartment houses, is of interest. The action was brought to test the validity of the new state law, by a person who claimed that he had been wrongfully denied a renewal of his lease on the ground that the landlord did not care to rent to families with children. The case, Longenccker v. Boyleston, came up before Judge Himes in the Municipal Court at Chicago Dec. 20. No oficial report is before us, but the decision seems to have proceeded upon the 'theory that the statute in question was a valid exercise of the police power of the state, though it remains to be seen whether the higher courts will sustain it as not interfering with freedom of contract. The Court saidt— "If a landlord can make a lease or contract such as is prohibited by this statute, might we not assume that many or perhaps all owners of desirable property would make the same kind of contracts and thus prevent children from living in desirable dwelling houses, apartments or flats adjacent to schools and in desirable localities? If con— tracts of this kind were made by the
