Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/09pdf/08-964.pdf
Page Number: 55

Cite as:  561 U. S. ____ (2010) 

35 

STEVENS, J., concurring in judgment 

addresses  “Patentability  of  Inventions  and  Grant  of  Pat-
ents.”  Particularly  because  petitioners’  reading  of  the
1999  Act  would  expand  §101  to  cover  a  category  of  proc-
esses that have not “historically been eligible” for patents, 
Diehr,  450  U.  S.,  at  184,  we  should  be  loath  to  conclude 
that Congress effectively amended §101 without saying so 
clearly.  We  generally  presume  that  Congress  “does  not,
one  might  say,  hide  elephants  in  mouseholes.”    Whitman 
v.  American  Trucking  Assns.,  Inc.,  531  U. S.  457,  468 
(2001).

The  Act  therefore  is,  at  best,  merely  evidence  of  1999 
legislative  views  on  the  meaning  of  the  earlier,  1952  Act. 
“[T]he views of a subsequent Congress,” however, “form  a
hazardous basis for inferring the intent of an earlier one.” 
United States v. Price, 361 U. S. 304, 313 (1960).  When a 
later  statute  is  offered  as  “an  expression  of  how  the  . . . 
Congress  interpreted  a  statute  passed  by  another  Con-
gress  . . .  a  half  century  before,”  “such  interpretation  has 
very  little,  if  any,  significance.”    Rainwater  v.  United 
States, 356 U. S. 590, 593 (1958). 

Furthermore,  even  assuming  that  Congress’  views  at 
the  turn  of  the  21st  century  could  potentially  serve  as  a 
valid  basis  for  interpreting  a  statute  passed  in  the  mid-
20th century, the First Inventor Defense Act does not aid 
petitioners  because  it  does  not  show  that  the  later  Con-
gress itself understood §101 to cover business methods.  If 
anything,  it  shows  that  a  few  judges  on  the  Federal  Cir-
cuit  understood  §101  in  that  manner  and  that  Congress
understood what those judges had done.  The Act appears
to reflect surprise and perhaps even dismay that business
methods  might  be  patented.    Thus,  in  the  months  follow-
ing  State  Street,  congressional  authorities  lamented  that
“business  methods  and  processes  . . .  until  recently  were 
thought  not  to  be  patentable,”  H. R.  Rep.  No.  106–464,
p. 121 (1999); accord, H. R. Rep. No. 106–287, pt.  1, p.  31