Not every new thing is patentable. Patents are granted for new and useful inventions or discoveries, or new and useful improvements thereof, and for new, original and ornamental designs for an article of manufacture. An inven tion or discovery, to be patentable, must be within one of four classes enumerated by the statute, i.e., an art, a machine, a manu facture or a composition of matter. An "art" is a process or method, and has been defined by the Supreme Court to be "a mode of treatment of certain materials to produce a given result." (Cochrane v. Deener, 94 U.S. 780.) "Manufacture" means an article of manufacture. "New" means not patented or described in any printed publication in this or any foreign country before the invention or discovery thereof by the applicant for the patent, or more than two years prior to his application for a patent thereon. Public use or sale of the invention in the United States by the inventor or others any time more than two years prior to the inventor's application for a patent renders the invention public property and bars the grant of a valid patent thereon. "Useful" means capable of use, or operative, and the degree of usefulness is immaterial, except in close cases, in which commercial success is sometimes persuasive on the point of patentability.
Patents for inventions run for 17 years from the date of issue (as distinguished from the date of application, which controls in most other countries). Patents for designs run for 3-1, 7 or 14 years, according to the term asked and fee paid. Patents can be extended only by special act of Congress, except that a patentee who "served honorably in the military or naval forces of the United States at any time between April 6, 1917, and Nov. II, 1918, and was subsequently honorably discharged" may have, between May 31, 1928, and Nov. 30, 1928, applied for an extension of his then existing patent for a term not exceeding three times the period of his enlistment (act of May 31st, 1928). Patents may be obtained for improvements on a prior patented invention, if additional invention was involved in making the improvement, but this does not extend the term of the original patent, and the improvement cannot be made, used or sold without consent of the owner of the earlier patent. Procedure in Granting Patents.—Applications must be signed and sworn to by 'the inventor, or by his executor or administrator, if deceased, or by his guardian, if insane. A drawing must be filed if the invention is capable of illustration by a drawing. Models are rarely required. The best embodiment of the invention known to the applicant must be described fully in the specification ending in a claim or claims which "particularly point out and distinctly claim the part, improvement or combi nation which he claims as his invention or discovery." The claims constitute the most important part of the application and should be drawn by an expert attorney to define all the novel features or combinations of elements disclosed, and no more. An applica
tion may be amended from time to time before allowance, so long as the scope of the original disclosure is not exceeded. The Patent Office examiners make an extensive examination of the prior art to determine the margin of novelty in the matter claimed and reject all claims found to be anticipated or informal. Appeals are possible from such rejection to a board of appeals and from it to the courts. If two or more separate applications are filed for patents covering the same feature of invention, an interference is declared and testimony may be taken on which the Patent Office will grant the claim in controversy to the party found to be the first inventor, provided it does not appear that he has lost his rights by inexcusable inactivity. An interference proceeding may also be had between an application and an issued patent if the applicant filed his claim within two years after the grant of the interfering patent. If the applicant proves to have been the first inventor a second patent will be issued to him. When two issued patents interfere, the one erroneously granted can be can celled by a U.S. court.
The whole patent, or an undivided interest therein, or the exclusive right for a given terri tory, may be assigned in writing. Such assignment should be acknowledged before a notary public, U.S. commissioner, secre tary of legation or consular officer authorized to administer oaths, to constitute prima facie evidence of execution, though the assign ment is valid without this formality. If not recorded in the Patent Office within three months after execution an assignment is void as against any subsequent purchaser or mortgagee for a valuable consideration who is without notice of such earlier assignment. If an assignment of an interest in an invention is recorded before the final fee is paid on the application claiming it, the patent will issue to the assignee as their interests may appear.
Certain States have laws regulating assignments of patent rights executed within their boundaries, which have been held valid by the U.S. Supreme Court as within the police powers of the States in preventing fraud. In Kansas and Indiana a certified copy of the patent and an affidavit by the seller must be filed with the clerk of the county in which the sale is effected. In these States and in New York, Georgia, Arkansas, North and South Dakota, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas and Vermont, a note or other obligation given for a patent right must have the words, "Given for a patent right," appearing on its face. In Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Rhode Island, a pedlar of patent rights or of patented articles must take out a licence. The penalties for violations of these laws are fines and imprisonment. In Tennessee they constitute felonies with imprisonment mandatory of from one to five years.