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A Historical Perspective on Patents

Why does the law recognize patents?

Patents were designed to reward persons for particular benefits provided to the government and the people with a monoply. Originally, the "benefits" was losely defined and the monopoly was not well connected to the benefit provided. In time the "benefit" to be offered became more narrowly defined to require a teaching about something unknown. The monopoly offered as a reward also became more closely related to the benefit. The inventor received a limited monoply on the subject matter of the teaching (i.e., the invention as described in the claims). The impact of these events still permiate patent law today.

How was the duration of a patent determined?

Utility patents, prior to Gatt, lasted 17 years from date of issuance. The master-apprentice relationship was a seven year relationship. Custom had it that when an apprentice learned something from his master that was not otherwise known in the trade (i.e., an invention) the apprentice would not practice it for two apprentice periods following the end of his apprenticeship. The master could have developed the invention at the start or at the end of the apprenticeship, making the average time in the middle. Adding half the existing apprenticeship period with the two subsequent apprenticeship periods (3 ½ + 7 + 7) gave 17 ½ years of a monopoly for the inventor. For convenience sake, the half year was dropped, giving a 17 year monopoly. Design and plant patents lasted 14 years from the date of issuance (7+7). Gatt changed the durations which are now based upon a compromise of time periods from the contracting governments.

How important was patent law during the formation of the United States of America?

The significance of patent laws was recognized by the drafters of the United States Constitution. Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 states: The Congress shall have power ...To promote the progress of science [patent] and useful arts [copyright], by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.Promulgation power for most federal law, including trademark law, is not seperately set forth in the Constitution like patent and copyright law, but rather is promulgated under the interstate commerce clause.Today, many people would cite the United States patent laws as the reason why the United States is a world leader in technology. The European Patent Office (EPC) and Japanese Patent Office have similar strong patent systems.

Did the United States Patent Office believe that all inventions would be uncovered?

Originally, it was believed that there was less than a thousand inventions that could ever be discovered. The number fluctuated somewhat and eventually was abandoned. One interesting result of the belief that we still enjoy today is found in the Library of Congress.The patent office originally required the submission of a working miniture model. Each of these models were to be donated to the Library of Congress, where they can still be found today. The reasoning behind such requirement is so that the Library of Congress would hold an example of every invention. This practice of submitting miniture models was discountinued as the estimated number of total inventions continued to increase and as space decreased.

About the Author:

N. Paul Friederichs, founder, started practice as a patent attorney in 1992 at a major Minneapolis, Minnesota law firm where he was the highest performing associate. In 1993, he started and developed Friederichs Law Firm with his father. Throughout this time Paul’s experience was heavily weighted toward litigation. He served such clients as Tonka Toys, American Harvest and Boston Medical.

He can be reached at http://www.angenehm.com/ and Angenehm@angenehm.com

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