422 



SCIENCE 



[N. 8. Vol. LI. No. 1322 



wliicli lias been introduced in Congress and 

 which provides as follows: 



S. 3223 & H. R. 9932. 



A BILL authorizing the Federal Trade Commis- 

 sion to accept and administer for the benefit of the 

 public and the encouragement of industry, inven- 

 tions, patents, and patent rights, and for other 

 purposes. 



Be it enacted hj the Senate and House of Rep- 

 resentatives of the United States of America in 

 Congress assembled, That the Federal Trade Com- 

 mission be, and hereby is, authorized and empow- 

 ered to accept assignment of, or license or other 

 rights or powers under, to develop, to issue or re- 

 fuse to issue licenses under, to encourage the in- 

 dustrial use and application of, and otherwise to 

 administer, on behalf of the United States, under 

 such regulations and in such manner as tihe Presi- 

 dent shall prescribe, inventions, patents, and patent 

 rights which said commission deems it to the ad- 

 vantage of the public to be so accepted, as these 

 may from time to time be tendered it by employees 

 of the various departments or other establishments 

 of the government, or by other lindividuals or agen- 

 cies; and to cooperate, as necessity may arise, with 

 scientific or other agencies of the government in the 

 discharge of the duties herein set out. 



Sec. S. That the Federal Trade Commission be, 

 and is hereby, authorized and empowered to collect 

 fees and royalties for licensing said inventions, 

 patents, and patent rights in such amounts and in 

 such manner as the President shall direct, and shall 

 deposit the same with the Treasurer of the United 

 States; and of the total amount of such fees and 

 royalties so deposited a certain per centum, to be 

 determined by the President, shall be reserved, set 

 aside, and appropriated as a special fund to be 

 disbursed as directed by the President to remune- 

 rate inventors for such of their inventions, patents, 

 and patent rights contemplated by this Act as may 

 prove meritorious and of public benefit. 



Sec. 3. That the Commissioner of Patents is 

 hereby directed to grant all patents and record all 

 assignments and licenses contemplated by this Act 

 without the payment of any fee. 



As is well known, the government has for 

 years been fostering and developing scientific 

 research among its workers, and this phase of 

 its activities has reached a very advanced state 

 of efficiency and productiveness, as exampli- 

 fied, for instance, by progressive improvements 

 in the macliines and methods of husbandry re- 



sulting from the labors of the Department of 

 Agriculture; by the safety appliances and 

 highly developed technical devices used in our 

 mines ; by the advancement in the methods and 

 processes of metallurgy, and by the ever-in- 

 creasing volume of chemical and other exact 

 scientific discoveries issuing from the govern- 

 ment laboratories. 



But many valuable contributions to knowl- 

 edge and a whole mass of scientific facts and 

 principles developed in the course of the nu- 

 merous and varied investigations carried on 

 by the government have failed to reach and 

 benefit the general public, because of a lack of 

 the means of translating them into actual, 

 practical service. There has always been an 

 obstruction in the way of making them ade- 

 quately and fully available to industry, be- 

 cause there has heretofore been no administra- 

 tive machinery for exercising this function. 



Various views have been held by government 

 officials concerning the legal status of patents 

 and patentable inventions developed by gov- 

 ernment employees in the course or as a re- 

 sult of their regular duties. In the process of 

 litigation in patent cases certain doctrines of 

 law have been laid down in court decisions 

 with regard to shop right, implied license, etc., 

 but these have not been uniformly understood 

 or applied in the government service. It is 

 a fact, however, that the law in regard to the 

 ownership of patents by government em- 

 ployees (excepting employees of the Patent 

 Office) is exactly the same as it i? for the em- 

 ployees of private individuals or corporations. 



A wide range of policy and point of view 

 has existed among the departments and even 

 among the different bureaus of the government 

 as to whether the inventor in government 

 service should be compelled to donate his in- 

 vention to the government, with or without 

 first patenting it, or whether he should donate 

 it at all; whether in the first event he should 

 receive any compensation therefor, or not, and 

 whether he has the right to develop his patent 

 himself, or to sell it to another; and questions 

 of ethics in this connection have frequently 

 arisen. Such considerations as these have 

 been dealt with piecemeal, arbitrarily, and 



