Appeal No. 2005-0841 Application No. 08/230,083 correct in our view. Nevertheless, we see nothing in the plurality's or concurrence's opinions which suggests that their decision to affirm the claim 14 rejection would be any different even if the aforementioned embodiments were incompatible. Under this circumstance, it would be impossible for a patentee to ever obtain reissue patent protection for an invention embodiment which had been erroneously never claimed during prosecution of the original application. Such an outcome would violate a reissue applicant's statutory rights including the right to enlarged claim scope. Third, the majority's determination, that patentee has surrendered subject matter which does not include the surrounding rim embodiment of original claim 2 and patent claim 1, is directly contrary to intrinsic record evidence in the form of patent claim 11. This is because patent claim 11, which is directed to an alternative clip connection embodiment, unquestionably does not contain any limitations specific to the surrounding rim embodiment. From our perspective, this undisputed fact by itself clearly invalidates any merit the majority's determination might otherwise seem to possess. In summary, we believe that any one of the above discussed reasons taken alone is adequate to reveal that the majority has impermissibly denied the appellant his right under 35 U.S.C. § 251 to enlarged claim scope as defined by claim 14. These reasons -73-Page: Previous 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 NextLast modified: November 3, 2007