keynote should be the prevention of unnecessary litigation by scientifically attacking the evil at its source. Better facilities, more comprehensive searches, few, but exact and precise, claims on the part of the attorney, a separate patent court to quickly dispose of cases that may be litigated, and Patent Office administrative changes that the Patent Bar Association has suggested in detail are preventive measures that will remedy present defects. Lessening the intelligibility of the patent contract will only add another burden to the already over-burdened courts.

1) Vol. 33 (1914) Transactions of Chartered Patent Agents p. 281-285 inclusive, p. 235-382 inclusive,"

2) "Patent Law Reform" by A. C. Fraser-N. Y. 1925.

TRADE MARK LAW DESIRABLE.

By KARL FENNING

The present trade mark registration statutes of the United States are frequently subject to adverse criticism. This is largely because the law tries to make new law without overriding the common law. In many respects the common law of trade marks in the United States hampers trade and worries the public because the economic commercial and industrial conditions which gave rise to the common law have been outgrown by our civilization The act of 1905 preserves common law rights in registered trade marks and the pending bill of the American Bar Association to recodify the trade mark laws goes even further by giving to a defendant in a suit under a registered mark all defenses he would have if the mark had not been registered. The bill covers 35 pages providing for registration. After all this elaboration it says it all amounts to nothing. The common law still controls and that is the defect of the situation.

Congress has authority over interstate commerce and may enact legislation overriding the common law.

There are difficulties at the present time under the common law, allowing one man in the west or one man in the south to sell flour under a trade mark and another man to sell different flour in Ohio and Indiana but under the same trade mark. That is what the common law allows and if that is to continue there will be trouble and confusion. The public is of most interest in any legislation. The purpose of all law fundamentally is public welfare-it must take care of the manufacturer and merchant but of the general public primarily; we have advanced to a state in our civilization now where the common law is of little avail in many respects. Hundreds of statutes have been enacted to cut away the common law or to replace it with something which is effective in our modern economic system.

If a manufacturer makes a tooth paste and advertises it in the Saturday Evening Post, it may be that he lives in Boston and has never sold the tooth paste excepting in Massachusetts, Vermont and Rhode Island. He hopes, however, to go further with his sales else he would not advertise in The Saturday Evening Post. He wants his business to grow and the modern method is to advertise in the national mediums. It will not help if before he gets to California or before he gets to St. Louis some one in Kentucky proceeds to make another tooth paste and put it out with the Boston man's trade mark and so head off his business.

The common law says the trade mark goes with the business and only with the business. Unless the business advances there is no trade mark and nothing can be done with the man who avails himself of anothers national advertising. Nor can any remedy be given the man who takes an automobile trip across the country and buys tooth paste under a trade mark in New England, a spuricus article under the same mark in New York, and another spurious tooth paste under the same mark in St. Louis. That man is being deceived and is being harmed

because he is not getting the genuine article everywhere. The manufacturer is being harmed because he is losing sales and possibly reputation by the spurious articles. Until Congress sees that and passes a trade mark law saying "we are going to stop that abuse-we say that the common law has passed" it will not come to a national point of view. The common law was built up in ages past and is changing constantly. The decisions of the courts are constantly changing. We are shifting and developing the common law and we cannot put into a statute anything which will make a definite common law. But we can cut out the common law and I think Congress should do it. Say to a man who comes into interstate commerce with his trade mark: "We will give you the exclusive right to that mark in interstate commerce. Say, to the man who wants to go into interstate commerce "You cannot go into interstate commerce with a trade mark unless you register the trade mark. Let us know what your trade mark is so that other people can keep out of your field." When Congress gets to that we will have a registration statute which will be worth while and of some value.

At the present time the registration statute is somewhat futile because first, we cannot collect enough trade marks to make the collection of real value, second, we cannot give a man enough by his registration to make it very valuable, and third, we cannot prevent somebody else from going ahead and using the registered trade mark in a distant neighborhood.

This defect is particularly aggravated when we remember that there is much international furor about the right to use a trade mark in a foreign country. There is a demand for a certificate of registration which will make it possible to register the mark in a foreign country where there is no present trade but a neglect of the need to prevent the use of the mark at home but in a distant part of our own country. The International Conventions say that when a trade mark is good in the United States it is

good throughout the world-with limitations to be sure. The Treaty revised at the Hague last fal! goes further than the present Treaty. Our South American Treaty has gone a long way. We do not stop here and rely on the common law to insist that the mark only goes with the trade. But why should not our Congress do as much for domestic commerce-for the New England man who wants to expand his business to the middle west-as it does for the man who wants to expand to Cuba or France. Why not be as solicitous to see that our own citizens in buying trademarked articles get genuine and not spurious as we are about the French purchases.

Congress can say to a meat packer "You cannot go into interstate commerce without our inspection mark". Why should not Congress also say "You cannot go into interstate commerce unless you have registered your trade mark-if you have a trade mark". To be sure that would not take care of interstate business. It will still be possible for a man to sell in Columbus, Ohio, without a registered mark. But people will soon decide to adopt only marks that can be used when the business grows into interstate proportions. They will come to Washington and get registered trade marks.

GALILEO'S PATENT.

By P. J. FEDERICO Asst. Exm'r. Div. 43.

From 1592 to 1610 Galileo was Professor of Mathemat ics at Padua, which was then part of the Republic of Venice. In addition to his scientific and philosophical attainments Galileo was also skilled as an engineer and was called upon many times to aid in the construction of public works and machines. One of these was a machine for raising water for which he was given a patent by the Venetian republic. Not much is known about the ma

chine itself save that though it was tried with success in the garden of the Contarini in Venice it never came into much use.

The patent was granted September 15, 1594. The papers relating to the grant are in the archives of Venice for 1594, the patent itself, that is: the Doge's decree is in the national library of Florence. All the papers are given on pages 126 to 129 of volume 19 of the national edition of the works of Galileo. There are five papers, the first is a petition from Galileo to the Doge; in the second paper, a committee of three members of the Council instructs the Purveyors of the Commune to examine the petition; the third paper gives the report of the Purveyors recommending the granting of the petition; the fourth paper is a resolution passed by the Council granting the monopoly and the last is the Doge's decree which may be considered as the patent. A translation of these papers in full is given:

1. Petition of Galileo, December 1593.

Most Serene Prince, Your Illustrious Lordship,

I, Galileo Galilei, have invented a machine for raising water and irrigating land with small expense and great convenience, which, with the motive power of a single horse, will continuously discharge water through twenty spouts to be found thereon.

I desire at present to reduce it to practice. but, it not being fit that this invention, which is my own, discovered by me with great labor and much expense, be made the common property of everybody, I humbly petition Your Serene Highness that you deign to favor me with that which by your benignity is readily granted to any expert. in every profession in similar cases; that is, that no one but myself or my heirs or those obtaining the right from me or from them be allowed to make, cause to be made, or, if made, use my said new instrument, nor with alterations to apply it to other uses with water or other things,