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Page Number: 11

8 

OIL STATES ENERGY SERVICES, LLC v. GREENE’S 
ENERGY GROUP, LLC 
Opinion of the Court 

Die & Tool Co. v. Nye Tool & Machine Works, 261 U. S. 24, 
40 (1923). 
  Additionally,  granting  patents  is  one  of  “the  constitu-
tional functions” that can be carried out by “the executive 
or  legislative  departments”  without  “  ‘judicial  determina-
tion.’ ”  Crowell, supra, at 50–51 (quoting Ex parte Bakelite 
Corp.,  supra,  at  452).    Article  I  gives  Congress  the  power 
“[t]o  promote  the  Progress  of  Science  and  useful  Arts,  by 
securing  for  limited  Times  to  Authors  and  Inventors  the 
exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discover-
ies.”    §8,  cl. 8.    Congress  can  grant  patents  itself  by  stat-
ute.    See,  e.g.,  Bloomer  v.  McQuewan,  14  How.  539,  548–
550 (1853).  And, from the founding to today, Congress has 
authorized  the  Executive  Branch  to  grant  patents  that 
meet the statutory requirements for patentability.  See 35 
U. S. C. §§2(a)(1), 151; see also Act of July 8, 1870, §31, 16 
Stat.  202;  Act  of  July  4,  1836,  §7,  5  Stat.  119–120;  Act  of 
Apr. 10, 1790, ch. 7, §1, 1 Stat. 109–110.  When the PTO 
“adjudicate[s]  the  patentability  of  inventions,”  it  is  “exer-
cising the executive power.”  Freytag v. Commissioner, 501 
U. S.  868,  910  (1991)  (Scalia,  J.,  concurring  in  part  and 
concurring in judgment) (emphasis deleted). 
  Accordingly,  the  determination  to  grant  a  patent  is  a 
“matte[r] involving public rights.”  Murray’s Lessee, supra, 
at 284.  It need not be adjudicated in Article III court. 

2 
  Inter  partes  review  involves  the  same  basic  matter  as 
the grant of a patent.  So it, too, falls on the public-rights 
side of the line. 
  Inter  partes  review  is  “a  second  look  at  an  earlier  ad-
ministrative grant of a patent.”  Cuozzo, 579 U. S., at ___ 
(slip  op.,  at  16).    The  Board  considers  the  same  statutory 
requirements that the PTO considered when granting the 
patent.  See 35 U. S. C. §311(b).  Those statutory require-
ments  prevent  the  “issuance  of  patents  whose  effects  are