It is not to be understood that the examination referred to an investigation of the prior art. The only examination required was of the petition, description, drawing, etc., of the application. The next patent act was amendatory in its nature, and was passed in 1793. Among other changes, it imposed the duty of issuing patents upon the secretary of state, subject, however, to the approval of the attorney general. From 1793 down to 1836, various unimportant amendments to the patent laws were enacted. In the last mentioned year, however, the first comprehensive law was passed relating to the granting of patents. This law remained in force until 1870, and was in fact in substance very much the same as our present laws. By the enactment of 1836, a sub-department of the state department was created, which was known as the patent office. Provision was made for the appointment of a commissioner of patents, and the commissioner of patents was required to make or to have made an examination of the alleged new invention or discovery to determine whether or not the same had been invented or discovered by any other person in the United States prior to the alleged invention thereof by the applicant and to determine whether or not in view of the prior art, the applicant was entitled to a patent. Prior to this act examinations were not required, and if the applicant averred that his alleged invention was new and novel, the commission or the secretary of state was required to grant or issue a patent upon his application, provided the discovery or invention of the applicant was deemed of sufficient importance. It will readily be seen that a patent granted under such circumstances was necessarily of very small commercial value, because it would not be reasonable to expect men to invest their capital in a species of property good title to which and the value of which were so uncertain. The act of 1836 established patent property upon a higher plane than it had ever before occupied and it is believed that the importance of this act to the people of the United States cannot be overestimated. Senator O. H. Platt, speaking in 1884, referring to this act, said: "To my mind, the passage of the act of 1836 creating the patent office marks the first important epoch in the history of our development-I think, the most important event in the history of our government from the constitution until the civil war. The establishment of the patent office marked the commencement of that marvelous development of the resources of the country which is the admiration and wonder of the world, a development which challenges all history for a parallel; and it is not too much to say that this unexampled progress has been not only dependent upon, but has been coincident with, the growth and development of the patent system of this country. Words fail in attempting to portray the advancement of this country for the last fifty years. We have had fifty years of progress, fifty years of inventions applied to the everyday wants of life, fifty years of patent encouragement, and fifty years of a development in wealth, resources, grandeur, culture, power which is little short of miraculous. Population, production, business, wealth, comfort, culture, power, grandeur, these have all kept step with the expansion of the inventive genius of the country; and this progress has been made possible only by the inventions of its citizens. All history confirms us in the conclusion that it is the development by the mechanic arts of the industries of a country which brings to it greatness and power and glory. No purely agricultural, pastoral people ever achieved any high standing among the nations of the earth. It is only when the brain evolves and the cunning hand fashions labor saving machines that a nation begins to throb with new energy and life and expands with a new growth. It is only when thought wrings from nature her untold secret treasures that solid wealth and strength are accumulated by a people." Under the patent laws now in force in the United States any person who has invented or discovered any new and useful art, machine, manufacture or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, not known or used by others in this country before his invention or dis |