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1 The part relating to the granting of patents to Government employees without fees.

2 The part relating to certified copies of drawings and specifications.

3 The part relating to fees for recording assignments.

4 The part amending R. S. 4894.

The part relating to the price of copies of patents.

6 The part relating to payment of fees.

7 The part relating to the fee for copies of specifications and drawings of patents.

Present: Representatives Bryson, Ramsay, Boggs, Rogers, Crumpacker, and Bakewell.

Also present: Charles J. Zinn, law revision counsel, Committee on the Judiciary; L. James Harris, committee counsel, Committee on the Judiciary.

Mr. BRYSON. Gentlemen, the committee will come to order, and as our friend Congressman Jennings used to say, "We hate to find ourselves like an Egyptian mummy, pressed for time."

We received a telegram this morning from the Democratic whip, Hon. Percy Priest, that we would be expected to be on the floor, and the House meets at 12 o'clock. We will try to make some arrangements about it, however.

We are pleased to note the interest in this hearing; and we will proceed as expeditiously as possible.

The first witness on the schedule is our law revision counsel, Mr. Charles J. Zinn, who will now make a brief statement.

The acoustics in this room are not too good, and if some of you gentlemen have difficulty in hearing you might move up here and occupy some of the seats nearer to the front.

All right, Mr. Zinn.

STATEMENT OF CHARLES J. ZINN, LAW REVISION COUNSEL,

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

Mr. ZINN. Mr. Chairman, I will make a brief preliminary statement regarding the background and objectives of this bill. As its title indicates the bill, H. R. 3760, is intended to revise and codify the laws relating to patents and enact into law title 35 of the United States Code entitled "Patents."

By a fortunate distribution of committee functions your subcommittee is charged both with the revision of the laws and with the consideration of bills relating to patents.

This bill is part of the comprehensive program of revising and enacting into law all the titles of the United States Code. Up to the present time 9 out of the 50 titles of the code have been revised and enacted into law and the committee is now engaged in the consideration or preparation of bills relating to a number of additional titles. The present patent laws consist of about 60 sections of the Revised Statutes of 1874, together with over 60 acts of Congress passed since that date amending various sections of the Revised Statutes or making new enactments not related to any section of the Revised Statutes. Since the sections of the Revised Statutes relating to patents were merely a compilation of the act of 1870, our present patent law, which is set out in title 35 of the United States Code, is essentially the act of 1870 with subsequent enactments.

The last general revision of the patent laws was the act of July 8, 1870, which was part of a program to revise and consolidate all the laws of the United States. In 1866 Congress passed a law providing for the revision and consolidation of the statutes of the United States. The Commission which was appointed to perform this work prepared preliminary draft of the part relating to patents and copyrights in 1868, and a second preliminary draft in 1869. The following year the statutes relating to patents and copyrights as revised, simplified, arranged, and consolidated by the Commission was reported to Congress, and at the same time referred to the Committee on Patents and bill was introduced by the chairman a few days later.

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The object of the Commission on Revision of the Laws was only to revise, arrange, and consolidate the statutes in force and the draft reported from the Commission presumably was for this purpose only.

The probable reason for referring the matter to the Committee on Patents was that during this same period there had been many suggestions for amending the patent laws in substance, and it appears that the Committee on Patents studied the draft of the Commission and changed it by various amendments on matters of substance. The bill thus introduced was enacted on July 8, 1870, 16 United States Statutes 198, and included the subjects of copyrights and trade-marks as well as patents.

When the Revised Statutes as in force on December 1, 1873, were enacted on June 22, 1874, the sections of the act of 1870 were distributed in various parts of the Revised Statutes.

For many years there was considerable agitation for a complete restatement and codification of all the laws of the United States inasmuch as the only such codification-the Revised Statutes of 1873had become generally outmoded on all subjects.

In 1926, in response to widespread recognition of the need therefor, and after nearly 7 years' effort on the part of the Committee on the Revision of the Laws, the Congress adopted the United States Code, which was a codification of the existing general and permanent laws of the United States arranged in 50 titles according to subject matter, and which was declared to be prima facie evidence of the law. Because of the enormity of that code Congress decided that it should undergo a testing period before it was enacted into positive law.

The code has now been subjected to such a testing period lasting 25 years, and the program of your committee enacting the titles into law has been in progress for several years.

About 2 years ago it was suggested that since this subcommittee had jurisdiction over both the revision of the laws and the subject of patents we ought to undertake the preparation of the present bill. The work was initiated by the preparation of a preliminary draft of a Proposed Revision and Amendment of the Patent Laws, which was printed and distributed in February of last year.

The preliminary draft included a collection of a large number of proposed amendments which had come to the attention of the Congress, as well as the codification itself. The preliminary draft was widely distributed with a request for criticisms and suggestions. As a result of the comments received, the committee decided to eliminate numerous proposed changes from the bill and defer them for later consideration, and to limit the bill to the main purpose of codification and enacting title 35 into law, with the further object of making a number of minor procedural and substantially noncontroversial changes.

Numerous suggestions were received by the committee from the patent bar and the public. Taking into consideration the suggestions and criticisms and other comments which had been received by the committee, a bill was prepared and introduced in the Eighty-first Congress, H. R. 9133, dated July 17, 1950. This bill was widely distributed and again comments were received by the committee from the patent bar and others. As a result of this material, the bill was reintroduced in revised form as the bill before us, H. R. 3760.

In the preparation of the draft leading to the present bill, all acts of Congress relating to or mentioning patents which have been enacted since 1874 were collected and studied, and those acts which had not been specifically repealed were used in preparing the drafts.

The changes introduced in the bill were obtained mainly by a study of all the bills relating to patents which had been introduced in Congress since 1925, and in addition the reports of various committees making studies of the patent laws, reports and recommendations of private groups, and other miscellaneous sources.

The committee as a matter of policy for a number of years has been calling on official and unofficial experts in the field to assist the committee, and our committee has been very fortunate in receiving the assistance of various persons like Mr. P. J. Federico of the Patent Office, and Captain Robillard of the Department of Defense; and the coordinating committee of the bar has rendered invaluable service to the committee in the preparation and study of the bill, and the report which will follow.

Mr. BRYSON. Thank you. Are there any questions?

STATEMENT OF HENRY R. ASHTON, REPRESENTING THE COORDINATING COMMITTEE ON REVISION AND AMENDMENT OF THE PATENT LAWS OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF PATENT LAW ASSOCIATIONS

Mr. BRYSON. Mr. Ashton, will you give the reporter your full name and address and in what capacity you now appear?

Mr. ASHTON. My name is Henry R. Ashton.

I appear in support of H. R. 3760 on behalf of the Coordinating Committee on Revision and Amendment of the Patent Laws, of which I am chairman.

Mr. BRYSON. You may be seated if you like, Mr. Ashton.

Mr. ASHTON. Thank you.

Mr. BRYSON. Do you have a prepared statement?

Mr. ASHTON. Yes. I have, of which 40 copies have been supplied to you, and I have additional copies here if anyone wishes a copy.

Mr. BRYSON. Do you have any preference as to whether you be permitted to make your complete statement before any questions are asked, or would you like to have questions propounded as you go along!

Mr. ASHTON. I have no objection whatsoever to having questions asked as I go along. However, we might expedite it a little more if they were withheld to the end.

Mr. BRYSON. We do want to conserve time because we have a number of witnesses to be heard this morning.

Mr. ASHTON. Yes, sir.

Mr. BRYSON. And we have to be as rapid as possible; so you may proceed.

Mr. ASHTON. Thank you. The committee was organized February 8, 1950. The following patent law associations, patent committees of general bar associations, and industrial associations have been regularly represented on or have otherwise participated in the work of this committee:

National Council of Patent Law Asso- District of Columbia Bar Association,
ciations
Patent Section

American Patent Law Association
Los Angeles Patent Law Association
American Bar Association, Patent Sec- Manufacturing Chemists Association
tion
Michigan Patent Law Association

American Drug Manufacturing Asso- Milwaukee Patent Law Association
ciation
Minnesota Patent Law Association

Association of the Bar of City of New National Association of Manufacturers

York, Patent Committee

Boston Patent Law Association

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New Jersey Patent Law Association
New York Patent Law Assciation
Oregon Patent Law Association
Philadelphia Patent Law Association
Pittsburgh Patent Law Association
Rochester Patent Group

St. Louis Bar Association, Patent Sec-
tion

San Francisco Patent Law Association
Seattle Patent Law Association
Toledo Patent Law Association

You will recall, Mr. Bryson, that on May 23, 1950, on the floor of the House of Representatives, you formally advised the House of the undertaking by your committee to revise and codify the patent laws. You called the attention of the House to your committee's now well-known committee print, which was prepared for and was issued by your committee on January 10, 1950, and which has served as the basis of all the work that has since been done, culminating in H. R. 3760 now under consideration. At the same time you very graciously made the following statement:

I am heartened by the manner in which the organized patent bar has come forward in a commendable and constructive fashion to help Congress in undertaking this formidable assignment. Your instantaneous cooperation has been one of the most dramatic evidences of the democratic process that I have had the pleasure of witnessing. With the attitude you have adopted I am confident that we shall perform a painstaking, objective study of the subject that will ultimately produce a body of laws which will serve our future as well as the present ones have served our past.

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