Page:Reciprocity in respect to patents and patent rights. A scheme for the consideration of the International American congress (IA reciprocityinres00seel).pdf/10

 Paris in 1883, and to which, along with many of the nations of Europe, several of those of America are parties. It is not known that any objection can arise to them, and they need no explanation.

Article III defines more clearly the nature of the reciprocity desired. It is not believed to be at variance with the existing law of any American state.

Article IV is in accordance with the law of the United States. It is more liberal than most of the Spanish American patent laws, since under them a patent may be vitiated after the grant if it is found that the invention had prior to application been so fully published as to make it possible to put it in practice. The laws of most European countries are similar in this respect, and the hardship they impose on the inventor is one that treaty stipulations have more than once sought to remove, by admitting of a term, during which, after publication of his invention according to the patent laws of one country, the inventor may deposit his application in another without prejudice by reason of the prior publication. The inventor encounters no such difficulty here. His prior patent may abridge the term of a patent in the United States, but neither the existence of such patent nor any publication under it can vitiate that granted to him by this Government.

The only ground on which the true inventor can be refused a patent in this country is that of public use or sale for two years in this country prior to the application. This applies alike to citizen and alien, to either of whom the law allows this liberal term in which he may not only test the operativeness of his invention, but, if he choose, its commercial value. There is no magical character in the term of two years, but it is in our patent system the term which has been established as the limit of delay. Thus, failure to apply for patent within two years after public use of the invention will cause the patent to be refused. Failure to complete an application within two years from filing a petition works abandonment; so does a failure to prosecute the case within two years after an action by the office. Failure to take out the patent within two years after allowance also works abandonment. And now the courts are inclined to hold that if the patent when granted is void, through error which may be cured by a re-issue, the application for re-issue must, under ordinary circumstances, be filed within two years from the original grant; otherwise it will be void.