While the Patent Act does not define “individual,” the Circuit relied on a previous U.S. Supreme Court rulinginterpreting “individual” to mean “a human being, a person,” albeit in a different statutory context. The Supreme Court ruling relied on the Dictionary Act (1 U.S.C. § 1) to conclude that an “individual” is a human being and that construal can only deviate if there is “some indication Congress intended” a different reading. The Circuit found no such indication in the Patent Act.

[4] Unauthorized sharing of SAR information is generally a crime. 31 U.S.C. § 5318(g)(2); 31 CFR §1020.320(e); 31 U.S.C. § 5322; 1 U.S.C. § 1 (defining “Person”). Prior guidance from FinCEN, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the Office of Thrift Supervision (collectively, the “Federal Banking Agencies”) allows U.S. banks, U.S. branches of foreign banks, securities broker-dealers, futures commission merchants, introducing brokers in commodities, U.S. mutual funds, and casinos to share SARs and SAR information with certain U.S. affiliates subject to SAR regulations, and limited categories of foreign parents, head offices, and controlling companies (“affiliated companies”).

There, the Court quoted from several well-known dictionaries and considered the use of the term in “everyday parlance,” to determine that the ordinary meaning of the term “individual” refers only to a human being or natural person. The Court in Mohamad also referred to the Dictionary Act, 1 U.S.C. § 1, which provides that the legislative use of the term “individual” denotes something separate and apart from non-human beings.The USPTO argued that the Supreme Court’s analysis in Mohamad is equally applicable to the Patent Act as it is to the TVPA.

Recently at the Tenth Circuit:Statutory interpretation: what does "a" mean?The Dictionary Act says that “words importing the singular include and apply to several persons, parties, or things” unless “the context indicates otherwise.” 1 U.S.C. § 1. What if that word is the singular article "a"? Well, as the Act suggests, it depends. If you want to know more, check out Banuelos v. Barr, in which the Tenth Circuit takes "a's" temperature and concludes that the words "a notice to appear" in 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(d)(1)(A) refer to a single document.

Beech Aircraft Corp. v. EDO Corp., 990 F.2d 1237, 1248 n.23 (Fed. Cir. 1993). 1 U.S.C. §8(a) (italics added); see also Return Mail , Inc. v. United States Postal Service, 139 S. Ct. 1853 (2019) (applying 1 U.S.C. §1 to the Patent Act, as amended by the AIA).Hybritech, Inc. v. Monoclonal Antibodies, Inc., 802 F.2d 1367, 1376 (Fed. Cir. 1986). 35 U.S.C §101 (limiting the award of patents to “whoever invents or discovers”); see 35 U.S.C §102(f) (pre-AIA) (listing failure to invent as mandating a “loss of right to patent”); see also In re VerHoef, 888 F.3d 1362, 1368 (Fed. Cir. 2018).

In a 6-3 opinion authored by Justice Sotomayor, the Supreme Court reversed the Federal Circuit, holding that the USPS failed to overcome the “longstanding interpretive presumption” that the statutory term “person” does not include the federal government. The Court observed this presumption reflects both “common usage,” and the express statutory directive from Congress in view of the Dictionary Act (1 U.S.C. § 1) (which defines a “person” as including “corporations, companies, associations, firms, partnerships, societies, and joint stock companies, as well as individuals,” but omits the federal government). The Court rejected USPS’s efforts to overcome this presumption, noting that USPS failed to persuade the Court that “person,” as used in Section 311 and 322, includes the government because the Patent Act elsewhere authorizes federal agencies to apply for patents and refers to them as “persons.”

This provision uses the singular (“a message”), the defendants told the court, and was not intended to regulate interactive exchanges of plural messages or a system that involves human interaction—like those in the Yodel calls.U.S. District Court Judge Stephen P. Friot from the Western District of Oklahoma disagreed. “These arguments are unpersuasive given the plain language and meaning of § 227(b)(1)(B), together with the principle of statutory construction embodied in 1 U.S.C. § 1,” he said.Having rejected the defendants’ arguments and in light of the matters expressly conceded by the defendants, the court found liability had been established and granted summary judgment in favor of Braver.Turning to NorthStar’s vicarious liability, Judge Friot found several facts weighed in favor of an agency relationship between NorthStar and Yodel. For starters, NorthStar was involved in determining the script for the prerecorded messages used by Yodel in the calls it made and was aware that Yodel intended to use—and did use—soundboard technology to deliver prerecorded voices in audio clips.

Stevens, 529 U. S. 765, 780–781 (2000). In addition, the federal Dictionary Act, 1 U. S. C. §1, provides the definition of “person” that courts use “[i]n determiningthe meaning of any Act of Congress, unless the context indicates otherwise.” The Dictionary Act’s definition of “person” does not include the federal government.The Court rejected several arguments raised by the Postal Service.

The Court also considered the Dictionary Act’s definition of person, which notably excludes the federal government from its list of persons. 1 U.S.C. § 1. To overcome the presumption, then, the Court explained that the Postal Service needed to make “some affirmative showing of statutory intent to the contrary.”

Thus, while there is significant academic question about the case, there is little direct practical effect to the Court's decision, regardless of how it rules.[1] 1 U.S.C. § 1.[2] Pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 315(c).