The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-05-03
YANKEES ARE NOT so SMART.

Englshmen Could Invent, Too, if Their Patent Office Did Not Make 1t So Ex- pensive.
 We frequently hear people in this country expressing surprise at the in- ventive genius of the American work men as compared with that of our own | We recently had occasion to discuss this subject with a well-known British engi- neer, when he told us that in his opin- ion, and he has been an employer of trained labor for over twenty years, the inventive faculty of the British artisan
 was every whit the equal of that of his
 American confrere. But" said our
 friend, when the American patent of flee fixed it's scale of fees 1t very wisely
 resolved not to retard the march of com mercial progress by urduly taxing in
 ventions, but rather sought to encour-
 age all inventors by giving them good
 patent at reasonable price" In con-
 flrmation of his statement our inform ant showed us five American patents
 that he had taken out for inventions
 which he said it would not be commer- cially worth his while to patent in Eng
 land. As a reason for this seemingly parodoxical proceeding, we are told that,
 while each of the American patents con-
 ferred protection for seventeen years for
 an initiau and final outlay in stamp
 fees of seven pounds, each of the cor responding English patents would have cost for the full term of only fourteen years no less than ninety-nine pounds apiece in stamp fees alone, figures which show, said our friend that pa- tent in this country costs In govern ment fees alone more than thirteen hun dred per cent. above and over hat pa- tent costs in America.
 Let us briefly consider the procedure in the two countries. Tn America as before stated the first and final patent of seven pounds covers the government fees for the full term of seventeen years. In England, since "The Patents, &c., Act, 1S83' came into force, the appli- cant for patent pays four pounds, which covers the grant of patent for term of four years, after which, to keep the patent in force for another ten years, he Is mulcted of further fees, amounting to ninety-fve pounds. That the lower initial fees under the 1893 act were fully appreciated Is borne out by the fact that in 1883, the last year of the old ds52) act, only 6.993 English pa tents were applied for. Next year, when the lower initial fee came into force, the applications had increased to 17.110, or by nearly three hundred per cent, figure which kept on increasing until, in 1897, 1t had reached 30,952. But of all these applications we are told in the official returns that less than seven per cent of all the patents granted by payment of renewal fees to the end of the thirteenth year. From this record 1t would seem that the treasury and not the lack of inventive faculty is the drag which prevents the progress of inven- ton among our workpeople. And this is the more apparent when we bear in mind that the total receipts of the Brit ish patent office in 1898 amounted to G22341 while the total expenditure, in- cluding pensions and the cost of new buildings, amounted to only G101,04S leaving the handsome surplus of G122,- 370 wrung out of inventors as an aid to the carrying on of other governmental partments.-London Shipping World.