Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/11pdf/10-545.pdf
Page Number: 22.0

18 

GOLAN v. HOLDER 

Opinion of the Court 

constructed  between  the  patent’s  expiration  and  the  bill’s 
passage.  Id.,  at  202.  See  also  Blanchard  v.  Sprague,  3 
F. Cas. 648, 650 (No. 1,518) (CC Mass. 1839) (Story, J.) (“I 
never  have  entertained  any  doubt  of  the  constitutional
authority  of  congress”  to  “give  a  patent  for  an  invention, 
which . . . was in public use and enjoyed by the community
at the time of the passage of the act.”).

This  Court  again  upheld  Congress’  restoration  of  an
invention  to  protected  status  in  McClurg  v.  Kingsland,  1 
How. 202 (1843).  There we enforced an 1839 amendment 
that recognized a patent on  an invention despite its prior 
use by the inventor’s employer.  Absent such dispensation, 
the  employer’s  use  would  have  rendered  the  invention 
unpatentable,  and  therefore  open  to  exploitation  without 
the inventor’s leave.  Id., at 206–209. 

Congress  has  also  passed  generally  applicable  legisla-
tion  granting  patents  and  copyrights  to  inventions  and 
works  that  had  lost  protection.    An  1832  statute  author-
ized  a  new  patent  for  any  inventor  whose  failure,  “by 
inadvertence, accident, or mistake,” to comply with statu-
tory  formalities  rendered  the  original  patent  “invalid  or
inoperative.”  Act  of  July  3,  §3,  4  Stat.  559.    An  1893 
measure  similarly  allowed  authors  who  had  not  timely 
deposited their work to receive “all the rights and privileg-
es”  the  Copyright  Act  affords,  if  they  made  the  required 
deposit by March 1, 1893.  Act of Mar. 3, ch. 215, 27 Stat. 
743.23    And  in  1919  and  1941,  Congress  authorized  the 
President  to  issue  proclamations  granting  protection  to
foreign works that had fallen into the public domain dur-
ing World Wars I and II.  See Act of Dec. 18, 1919, ch. 11, 

—————— 

23 Section  514  is  in  line  with  these  measures;  like  them,  it  accords 
protection  to  works  that  had  lapsed  into  the  public  domain  because  of 
failure to comply with U. S. statutory formalities.  See supra, at 9, and 
n. 11.