Pueblo chieftain., 1921-01-30
BY Frederic j. Haskin.


Washington, d. c., Jan. 27.-It now
takes an inventor over a year to get
even the simplest patent in the United
States, and after he has gotten pat
cnt 1t Is far from affordinG him the
perfect protection which it is supposed
to give. The value of a United States
patent is decreasing year by year.
These are the outstanding facts
which have been presented to con-
Eress in connection with the patent
office bill which is now being consid
cred there. They are due to n small.
underpaid force and consequent Ia
Dor turnover which would be ruinous
to any private concern.
That our patent system is not cf-
ficient is due to no fault of its en-
ploycs. 1t is almost impossible to get
congress to add even few moro OK
aminers TO the staff of the BUREAU
tho the work is obviously getting
heavier all the time. When an invcn-
tion is presented TO the bureau it is
presumed that steps will be taken to
decide whether it is eligible for a pat
cnt. And that is what the examiners
! try to decide. But there arc more than
i .30D,O0 United States patents. and
while these are divided into classes
and sub-classes. the work of compar-
ing the new invention with all of its
kind is long and cxacting job. And.
as the number of patents is increased
ny soitit bu,uvV Vdti Scdi u ~
takes longer each year to make
searches. or else they must be less
thoro. The latter alternative is alone
possible. because business brought to
the patent office is steadily on tho
increase as tho inventive genius of the
most inventive people on earth flour
ishcs.
Slow system
This is the disheartenins situation
~ ea. .
now takes at least a year and a half
to put a patent thru-the average
patent. with no complica tions. And un-
less the force working on patents is in
creased to meet the heavier work, and
salaries raised sufficiently to attract
and hold competent men, it will take
longer.
Another result of an inadequate and
upderpaid patent force is that United
States patent grant is coming to mean
less and less. One judge recently told
the house patents committee that n
patent was not n real protection to the
inventor until it had been hru the
courts-generally two or more of them.
because the decision of a circuit court
in one section of the country might not
be upheld by a court governing an
other section. In other words, 1t is
almost a part OF patent procedure to
expect law suit to prove priority of
your invention or that you are not in
fringing on some one clsc's rights.
Patent examiners. have never been
allowed to do their work thoroly. as the
| law provides. At the very beginning of
the system, in 1885, the statutes de-
| creed that to be patentabic an invcn-
tion must not only have been patented.
but II must not have been previously
known or used in this country. These
last two conditions were rewritten into
the patent examination system in 1885.
but they have never been taken SER
iously by the overworked patent office.
AS matters stand now. what chance
has an examiner to know II an inven-
tion is really new provided it has not
been patented by some one else? All
the examiner can do is to make a
cursory survey of patents in the par
ticular class to which the device be-
longs to see that the same idea is not
embodied there. He also decides
whether theoretically the. invention Is
useful and practical. tho he has no
means of actually seeing 1t work.
Patents Often Useless
After the patent is granted, per-
haps the inventor will find that some