No. 199.] 379 



unacquainted with what previously existed, or one under an anxiety 

 to hastily dispatch what appeared to him to be of little consequence, 

 the different acts are yoked together by their respective titles^, illy 

 adapted to each other, and in many respects, still less suitable to the 

 subject-matter to which they appertain, and left to be joined and con- 

 nected by the construction of com'ts at great expense to the public, 

 and to the ruin of inventors. Added to this manifest want of due at- 

 tention to what has been done, is the culpable neglect of doing more. 



The experience of the past has indicated to every observant citizen, 

 acquainted with this subject, the necessity of further legislation to pro- 

 perly adjust and regulate the respective rights of the public and inven- 

 tors. And repeated petitions, prayers and supplications have gone 

 up to Congress for a series of years, and their wisdom has been ear- 

 nestly besought and relied upon, to remedy the evils ; still the only 

 response to all this, has been a few meagre enactments, inadequate to 

 supply even the particular deficiencies for which they were intended, 

 and leaving others still more grievous, entirely untouched. The sub- 

 ject has not been handled by Congress in a manner corresponding at 

 all wdth its importance, nor partaken of the distinguished wisdom of 

 that body, annually expended upon themes of less magnitude. 



And it seems, that either there has been a want of sufficient ac- 

 quaintance with the subject-matter of the Patent Laws, and it has ap- 

 peared so abstruse and perplexing as to deter a grapple with it, or, 

 that its entire freedom from exciting party characteristics has clothed 

 it with a garb of passive indifference. Let there be no complaint 

 without cause. But is not a subj*ect-matter, annually opening new 

 mines of wealth and power to the country, in which the public, col- 

 lectively, and every individual directly or indirectly are interested, 

 and which involves the most sacred rights to private property, and 

 that of a peculiar and most difficult kind to regulate by law, of suffi- 

 cient importance to elicit the full attention and command the best wis- 

 dom of the Legislature of an enlightened people ? And has it re- 

 ceived this*? 



V\ hen was the time, at which these laws were made the subject of 

 an open and full discussion by these distinguished representatives of 



