We have, in this publication, an accurate description of the process covered by appellant's patent.

We have the rolls used for the identical purpose therein set forth; namely, to reduce the middlings and to flatten out the germs, so that they can be separated by bolting or sifting, thus preparing the middlings to be again ground and reduced to middlings flour.

Appellant insists, however, that the process described by Kick is* not applied to purified middlings, and therefore differs from his.

But it appears, from the well-known state of the art, that ever since purifiers were invented it has been the practice to purify middlings before reducing them, so that whenever the grinding of middlings is mentioned, graded and purified middlings are understood. The process of purifying, in case of gradual reduction, is as elementary as bolting, and follows every reduction of the material. When, therefore, Kick speaks of passing middlings through the rolls for another reduction, he must be understood to mean purified middlings. But the evidence in the record clearly shows that the action of the rolls, and their effect upon the product of the mill, would be the same whether purified or unpurified middlings, or even wheat, were used.

Appellant further insists that his process differs from that described by Kick, because the rolls mentioned in the latter run with unequal speed. This contention is founded on a misapprehension. The extract from Kick's work expressly says that "the action of the rolls evidently depends on their relative motion, viz., whether both rolls have like or different velocities." Rolls, therefore, with the same or different velocities could be used in the process described by Kick. His method included both.

*

We are also of opinion that the process which appellant claims as his invention was also clearly described as early as the year 1847 in a publication called Anglo-American and Swiss Science Milling, by Christian Wilhelm Fritzsch, published at Leipsic by Gustav Brauns. This description of the process of manufacturing flour is illustrated by drawings, which make it perfectly clear that the different parts of the process of the appellant were anticipated and publicly printed more than 25 years before the appellant, according to his own story, conceived the improvement described in his patent.

Fritzsch describes the process as follows:

"The advantages to be derived from the roll mill consist chiefly in this: that in operating them a considerable saving of power is achieved as compared with stone mills. Furthermore, the flour produced is of excellent quality, both in whiteness and fineness.

"Inasmuch as the wheat is ground in a dry state, the flour produced is especially adapted, with respect to durability, for transportation and storing. "The principle on which all said improvements turn, centers wholly and exclusively in a desire to effect the grinding of wheat so that not only the largest possible quantity of good middlings flour is obtained, but also that this may be separated from the hull or bran in its original purity; or, to ex

$476

press it in plainer words, to obtain the mealy interior substance without admixture of any part of the hull.”

Then follows a description of the mill by which the reduction of the wheat to coarse middlings is effected:

"The rough-ground product discharged from the mill (in which, besides middlings, flour has been produced) is thereupon most conveniently carried into the upper stories of the mill building by means of an elevator, and is then first transferred to a flour cylinder for the purpose of separating the flour. The remainder then goes upon a grit cylinder, where the material is assorted and separated from the hull in four different grades of middlings. The middlings thus obtained are thereupon likewise cleaned in the manner already described, and prepared for flouring.

"The grinding of middlings takes place by a manipulation varying but little from the process of rough grinding, by means of a flouring mill, which, together with the crushing mill above mentioned, constitutes a set or run. We see this flouring mill upon our plate, (fig. 8.) Its construction is in the main like that of the other, only the difference that the upper pairs of rolls are not fluted, like those in figure 7, but have smooth turned surfaces, and consequently no under layers, (wedges.) This under layer (wedge) is only used with the under pair of rolls, which are finely fluted.

"The middlings ready for grinding are here also put into the hopper, as shown, and carried to the first, second, and third pairs of rolls, in the manner described. The upper two pairs of rolls crush and triturate the middlings to the utmost degree; therefore, it remains for the last lower pair of rolls to shake up the flour.

"This product, thus finely ground, is now transferred to the cylinder bolt for separating the flour. The bran-like surplus is carried with the bolts to a stone mill, to be completely ground out.

"The grinding of middlings in the manner above described has many advantages in its favor, especially in this: that the hull particles still contained in the middlings are, by this process, not any longer decomposed or torn up, whereby the possibility of transfer of them into the flour is avoided."

In this description we have the purifying of the middlings by a purifier, which is shown in the cut, then the passing of them between two pairs of smooth revolving rolls of equal diameter, which are in all respects like the rolls described in the specification of appellant's patent, and which necessarily perform the same function. Then the disintegration, or shaking up, as it is called, of the ribbons or sheets of the material which come from the second pair of rolls, by passing them through the third pair, which are fluted, but are not allowed to touch each other, and then their transfer to the bolting cylinder, by which the flour is separated from the bran and germs.

The only difference between this process and that described in appellant's patent is that the last two sets of rolls but one, mentioned in the process described by Fritzsch, completely reduce the middlings to flour, while in the process under appellant's patent the middlings, after passing between the rolls, being separated from the germs and bran, are again ground between stones; but the great feature of appellant's process, the flattening of the germs and pellicle, by passing the middlings between rolls, is found in the method described by Fritzsch.

The advantages from the process described by Fritzsch are identical with those claimed for the process described in appellant's patent: First, a saving of power; second, the hull of the wheat (and necessarily the germ) is not disintegrated and torn up in passing between the rolls as it would be between the ordinary millstones, and can, therefore, be eliminated by the bolt; and, third, the yield of highgrade flour is increased, and the flour produced is of excellent quality, both in whiteness and fineness, and fitness for transportation and storing.

The printed publications relied on to defeat the appellant's patent describe the process covered thereby so fully and clearly as to enable persons skilled in the art to which the invention relates to carry on the process. In fact, the description of the process in the printed publications is, to say the least, quite as precise, clear, and intelligible as in the specification and claim of the patent.

The earliest date at which the appellant claims to have invented his improvement is stated by him as in 1872 or 1873. These publications, therefore, which antedate his invention,-one by at least one year, and the other by 25 years,—are fatal to the validity of the patent.

The decree of the circuit court, which dismissed the bill, must therefore be affirmed; and it is so ordered.

This case was decided at the October term, 1882, but owing to the inability of the clerk to furnish a corrected copy, its publication was delayed until this number.

v.8-2

(109 U. S. 3)

"THE CIVIL RIGHTS CASES."

UNITED STATES v. STANLEY.

[On a Certificate of Division in Opinion between the Judges of the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Kansas.]

UNITED STATES v. RYAN.

[In Error to the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of California.]

UNITED STATES v. NICHOLS.

[On a Certificate of Division in Opinion between the Judges of the Circuit Court of the United States for the Western District of Missouri.]

UNITED STATES v. SINGLETON.

[On a Certificate of Division in Opinion between the Judges of the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.]

ROBINSON and wife v. MEMPHIS & CHARLESTON R. Co.

[In Error to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Western District of

Tennessee.]

(October 15, 1883.)

CONSTITUTIONAL LAW-CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF MARCH 1, 1875-THIRTEENTH AND FOURTEENTH AMENDMENTS.

The first and second sections of the civil rights act, passed March 1, 1875, are unconstitutional enactments as applied to the several states, not being authorized either by the thirteenth or fourteenth amendments of the constitution. The fourteenth amendment is prohibitory upon the states only, and the legisla tion authorized to be adopted by congress for enforcing it is not direct legislation on the matters respecting which the states are prohibited from making or enforcing certain laws, or doing certain acts, but is corrective legislation, such as may be necessary or proper for counteracting and redressing the effect of such laws or acts.

The thirteenth amendment relates only to slavery and involuntary servitude, (which it abolishes;) and although, by its reflex action, it establishes universal freedom in the United States, and congress may probably pass laws directly enforcing its provisions; yet such legislative power extends only to the subject of slavery and its incidents; and the denial of equal accommodations in inns, public conveyances, and places of public amusement, (which is forbidden by the sections in question,) imposes no badge of slavery or involuntary servitude upon the party, but, at most, infringes rights which are protected from state aggression by the fourteenth amendment.

Whether the accommodations and privileges sought to be protected by the first and second sections of the civil rights act, are, or are not, rights constitutionally demandable; and if they are, in what form they are to be protected, is not now decided.

Nor is it decided whether the law, as it stands, is operative in the territories and District of Columbia; the decision only relating to its validity as applied to the states.

Nor is it decided whether congress, under the commercial power, may or may not pass a law securing to all persons equal accommodations on lines of public conveyance between two or more states.

HARLAN, J., dissents.

Sol. Gen. Phillips, for plaintiff, the United States.

No counsel for defendants, Stanley, Ryan, Nichols, and Singleton. Wm. M. Randolph, for plaintiffs in error, Robinson and wife.

W. Y. C. Humes, for defendant in error, the Memphis & Charleston R. Co.

BRADLEY, J. These cases are all founded on the first and second sections of the act of congress known as the "Civil Rights Act," passed March 1, 1875, entitled "An act to protect all citizens in their civil and legal rights." 18 St. 335. Two of the cases, those against Stanley and Nichols, are indictments for denying to persons of color the accommodations and privileges of an inn or hotel; two of them, those against Ryan and Singleton, are, one an information, the other an indictment, for denying to individuals the privileges and accommodations of a theater, the information against Ryan being for refusing a colored person a seat in the dress circle of Maguire's theater in San Francisco; and the indictment against Singleton being for denying to another person, whose color is not stated, the full enjoyment of the accommodations of the theater known as the Grand Opera House in New York, "said denial not being made for any reasons by law applicable to citizens of every race and color, and regardless of any previous condition of servitude." The case of Robinson and wife against the Memphis & Charleston Railroad Company was an action brought in the circuit court of the United States for the western district of Tennessee, to recover the penalty of $500 given by the second section of the act; and the gravamen was the refusal by the conductor of the railroad company to allow the wife to ride in the ladies' car, for the reason, as stated in one of the counts, that she was a person of African descent. The jury rendered a verdict for the defendants in this case upon the merits under a charge of the court, to which a bill of exceptions was taken by the plaintiffs. The case was tried on the assumption by both parties of the validity of the act of congress; and the principal point made by the exceptions was that the judge allowed evidence to go to the jury tending to show that the conductor had reason to suspect that the plaintiff, the wife, was an improper person, because she was in company with a young man whom he supposed to be a white man, and on that account inferred that there was some improper connection between them; and the judge charged the jury, in substance, that if this was the conductor's bona fide reason for excluding the woman from the car, they might take it into consideration on the question of the liability of the company. The case is brought here by writ of error at the suit of the plaintiffs. The cases of Stanley, Nichols, and Singleton come up on certificates of division of opinion between the judges below as to the constitutionality of the first and second sections of the act referred to; and the case of Ryan, on a writ of error to the judgment of the circuit court for the district of California sustaining a demurrer to the information.