Appeal No. 2000-0520
Application No. 08/956,160
the rectangular cross-section of the lower end of the post.
In rejecting claims 9 and 10 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a),
the examiner has concluded that it would have been obvious to
one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was
made "to use the bracket, as taught by Katz, to modify the
[admitted] prior art to provide a support bracket that can be
readily removed without dismantling the railing and to provide
additional strength" (answer, page 3, quoting from the final
rejection). In other words, the examiner considers that it
would have been obvious "to use a bracket, as taught by Katz,
to hold the balusters in the railing assembly of the prior art
disclosed in the preamble of the Jepson type claim 9 so as to
readily remove a piece of the railing without having to
dismantle the railing" (answer, page 5).
The appellants have not disputed the obviousness of this
proposed combination of the admitted prior art and Katz.
Rather, the appellants in essence contend that the examiner's
rejection is unsound because the combination would not meet
the limitations in claim 9 requiring the first and second
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