The Constitution of the United States, which was first adopted in 1787, even has a clause in it referring to patents: “The Congress shall have power…To 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 Discoveries.” Since then, many patent acts have followed:
The Patent Act of 1790 was the first federal patent statute of the United States. Although short, the statute stated that those patenting their inventions had the exclusive right to use them for 14 years. However, no extension was possible, which many inventors weren’t happy about since it often took several years for their inventions to be commercialized. It also wasn’t possible for foreigners to patent anything in the US.
The Patent Act of 1793 replaced the former Patent Act and the whole process was made much simpler. Between the Patent Act of 1790 and the Patent Act of 1973, only 57 patents were granted, but between the latter and the following one in 1836, 10,000 were granted. The wave of patents put the patent office under so much pressure that many patents were getting granted that were neither original nor useful. This led to lawsuits being filed over patent validity and infringement.
Next came the Patent Act of 1836 in the hope of it fixing some of the previous act’s problems. An official patent office was created, which greatly improved the quality of the patents that were granted. The option of extending the 14 year protection by 7 years also came into play. For the first time, foreigners were also able to apply for US patents.
The Patent Act of 1952 stated that inventions had to be “non-obvious”, which had the aim of preventing people from taking ownership or knowledge in a particular field.
In 2011, the Leahy-Smith American Invents Act (AIA) switched the U.S. patent system from “first to invent” to “first inventor to file”. This had been debated for decades and the U.S. had been the only country to still be using the “first to invent” system.