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CHAPTER X 
THE PATENT MONOPOLY 
NOTE 
For several years past the United Shoe Machinery Company has 
been regarded, and with reason, as the foremost example of a Patent 
Monopoly. This concern is, moreover, a combination, since prior 
to 1897 much of the machinery now controlled by the single com 
pany was divided among four concerns and was therefore, subject 
to at least limited competition. In February 1897 the United 
Shoe Machinery Company was organized under the laws of the 
State of New Jersey. By means of an issue and exchange of its 
capital stock it took over the business of four concerns—the Con 
solidated and McKay Lasting Machine Company, Goodyear Shoe 
Machinery Company, McKay Shoe Machinery Company and 
Eppler Welt Machine Company. Since that time the United Shoe 
Machinery Company has substantially controlled the shoe ma 
chinery business of the United States which has been handled 
strictly upon a lease basis. Powerful as the company has been it 
has been constantly threatened by the invention of new types of 
shoe machinery. Frequently it has been compelled to buy out such 
potential competitors, often at high valuations. The license or 
lease system of the United Shoe Machinery Company is shown 
below in the exhibits by a typical lease contract. There has also 
been included another typical lease or license agreement, that of 
the Motion Picture Patents Company and one of the Crown Cork 
and Seal Company. 
The last exhibit in this chapter consists of excerpts from the 
decision handed down in March 1912 in the so-called Dick case. 
Influential as was the decision in the Dr. Miles Medical Company 
case, in restricting the tendency toward monopolistic control so 
far as the conditions and terms of sale have reference to unpatented 
articles, the Dick case goes the full length in the opposite direction 
and upholds in the most sweeping language the power of concerns 
and individuals holding patents to impose whatsoever conditions