''The Telephone Cases'', 126 U.S. 1 (1888), were a series of US court cases in the 1870s and the 1880s related to the

invention of the telephone The invention of the telephone was the culmination of work done by more than one individual, and led to an array of lawsuits relating to the patent claims of several individuals and numerous companies. Early development The concept of th ...

, which culminated in the 1888 decision of the

US Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...

upholding the priority of the patents belonging to

Alexander Graham Bell Alexander Graham Bell (, born Alexander Bell; March 3, 1847 – August 2, 1922) was a Scottish-born inventor, scientist and engineer who is credited with patenting the first practical telephone. He also co-founded the American Telephone and T ...

. Those telephone patents were relied on by the American Bell Telephone Company and the

Bell System The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over one hundr ...

although they had also acquired critical microphone patents from

Emile Berliner Emile Berliner (May 20, 1851 – August 3, 1929) originally Emil Berliner, was a German-American inventor. He is best known for inventing the lateral-cut flat disc record (called a "gramophone record" in British and American English) used with a ...

. The objector (or

plaintiff A plaintiff ( Π in legal shorthand) is the party who initiates a lawsuit (also known as an ''action'') before a court. By doing so, the plaintiff seeks a legal remedy. If this search is successful, the court will issue judgment in favor of t ...

) in the notable Supreme Court case was initially the

Western Union The Western Union Company is an American multinational financial services company, headquartered in Denver, Colorado. Founded in 1851 as the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company in Rochester, New York, the company cha ...

telegraph company, which was then a far-larger and better financed competitor than American Bell Telephone. Western Union advocated several more recent patent claims of Daniel Drawbaugh,

Elisha Gray Elisha Gray (August 2, 1835 – January 21, 1901) was an American electrical engineer who co-founded the Western Electric Manufacturing Company. Gray is best known for his development of a telephone prototype in 1876 in Highland Park, Illino ...

Antonio Meucci Antonio Santi Giuseppe Meucci ( , ; 13 April 1808 – 18 October 1889) was an Italian inventor and an associate of Giuseppe Garibaldi, a major political figure in the history of Italy.

and Philip Reis in a bid to invalidate Alexander Graham Bell's master and subsidiary telephone patents dating back to March 1876. Western Union's success would have immediately destroyed the Bell Telephone Company, and Western Union could have become the world's largest telecommunications monopoly in Bell's place. The US Supreme Court came within one vote of overturning the Bell patent because of the eloquence of lawyer Lysander Hill for the Peoples Telephone Company. In a lower court, the Peoples Telephone Company stock rose briefly during the early proceedings but dropped after its claimant, Daniel Drawbaugh, took the stand and testified: "I don't remember how I came to it. I had been experimenting in that direction. I don't remember of getting at it by accident either. I don't remember of anyone talking to me of it."Billings, A. ''Bell and the Early Independents'', Telephone Engineer and Management, March 15, 1985, pp87-89, In the case, the Supreme Court affirmed: *''Dolbear v. American Bell Tel. Co.'', 15 F. 448, 17 F. 604, *''Molecular Tel. Co. v. American Bell Tel. Co.'', 32 F. 214, and *''People's Tel. Co. v. American Bell Tel. Co.'', 22 F. 309 and 25 F. 725. The Supreme Court reversed ''American Bell Tel Co. v. Molecular Tel. Co.'', 32 F. 214. Bell's second fundamental patent expired on January 30, 1894, when the gates were then opened to

independent telephone companies An independent telephone company was a telephone company providing local service in the United States or Canada that was not part of the Bell System organized by American Telephone and Telegraph. Independent telephone companies usually operated in ...

to compete with the Bell System. In all, the American Bell Telephone Company and its successor,

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile ...

, litigated 587 court challenges to its patents, including five that went to the US Supreme Court and, aside from two minor contract lawsuits, never lost a single case that was concluded with a final stage judgment.Australasian Telephone Collecting Society
Who Really Invented The Telephone?
ATCS, Moorebank, NSW, Australia. Retrieved from www.telephonecollecting.org website on April 22, 2011.

Size

The Court's decision in the ''Telephone Cases'' is notable for the size of the opinions delivered; together, they occupy the entire 126th volume of the ''

United States Reports The ''United States Reports'' () are the official record ( law reports) of the Supreme Court of the United States. They include rulings, orders, case tables (list of every case decided), in alphabetical order both by the name of the petitioner ...

''.

Notable cases

Among the notable court cases involving the

Bell Telephone Company The Bell Telephone Company, a common law joint stock company, was organized in Boston, Massachusetts, on July 9, 1877, by Alexander Graham Bell's father-in-law Gardiner Greene Hubbard, who also helped organize a sister company – the New Engl ...

, later renamed to the American Bell Telephone Company, were those related to challenges by

, a principal in

Western Electric The Western Electric Company was an American electrical engineering and manufacturing company officially founded in 1869. A wholly owned subsidiary of American Telephone & Telegraph for most of its lifespan, it served as the primary equipment ma ...

, as depicted in the Elisha Gray and Alexander Bell telephone controversy. Additionally the Bell Company became embroiled in a number of challenges from those companies associated with

Antonio Meucci Antonio Santi Giuseppe Meucci ( , ; 13 April 1808 – 18 October 1889) was an Italian inventor and an associate of Giuseppe Garibaldi, a major political figure in the history of Italy.

, as shown in the Canadian Parliamentary Motion on Alexander Graham Bell, itself a response to the United States HRes. 269 on Antonio Meucci.

References

;Notes ;Bibliography * Brooks, John
Telephone: The First Hundred Years
Harper & Row, 1976, , . * Bruce, Robert V
Bell: Alexander Bell and the Conquest of Solitude
Ithaca, New York:

Cornell University Press The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University; currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, making it the first university publishing enterprise in ...

, 1990. .

External links

* * Legat, V. 1862. ''Reproducing sounds on extra galvanic way'' ited March 26, 2006 Availabl
Litigation Series – Telephone Interferences: Edison Exhibits
contained within: ** Legat, Wilhelm von (1862) ''Litigation Series – Telephone Interferences: Edison Exhibits'', which covers: (Reis, Philip) Telephone; Sound and Acoustics;

Thomas Edison National Historical Park Thomas Edison National Historical Park preserves Thomas Edison's laboratory and residence, ''Glenmont'', in West Orange, New Jersey, United States. These were designed, in 1887, by architect Henry Hudson Holly. The Edison laboratories operat ...

, I2459; TAEM 11:635 Quote: :: {{DEFAULTSORT:Telephonecases, The Alexander Graham Bell Bell System Business rivalries Discovery and invention controversies History of the telephone United States Supreme Court cases 1888 in United States case law Western Union United States Supreme Court cases of the Waite Court AT&T litigation

Size

Notable cases

See also

References

Further reading

External links