CHAPTER VI

A

SOMETIME DUTIES OF THE DEPARTMENT

S the Department of State was created to manage, not only foreign affairs, but such domestic duties as did not fall under the War and Treasury Departments, it performed certain functions which in the development of executive machinery subsequently passed out of its jurisdiction.

First of these in magnitude is the granting of patents for inventions. The Act of April 10, 1790, which first regulated the business, authorized the Secretary of State, Secretary of War, and AttorneyGeneral, or any two of them, to issue letters patent in the name of the United States, upon petition setting forth the invention or discovery of "any useful art, manufacture, engine, machine, or device, or any improvement therein, not before known or used," if the invention or discovery was deemed to be useful and important, granting to the petitioner, for a term not exceeding fourteen years, the sole and exclusive right of making, using, and selling it. The AttorneyGeneral was to examine the letters patent, and, if he found them to conform to the act, was to so certify and present them to the President, who was to cause the seal of the United States to be affixed, when they became available, and, after having been recorded in the Secretary of State's office and endorsed by him,

they were to be delivered to the patentee or his agent. The grantee was to deposit descriptions, specifications, drawings, and models, and certified copies of the specifications were to be accepted before all courts as competent evidence. Copies of specifications and permission to have copies of models made were to be granted upon application to the Secretary of State. Penalties were provided for infringements. The fees to be paid by patentees to the several officers who made out the letters patent were: for receiving and filing the petition, fifty cents; for filing specifications, ten cents for every copy sheet of one hundred words; for making out the patent, two dollars; for affixing the great seal, one dollar; for endorsing the day of delivering the patent, and all intermediate services, twenty cents.1 Remsen, the chief clerk of the Department, who was immediately in charge of the patent business, prepared the papers for final action by the board, and the patent granted to Samuel Hopkins July 31, 1790, which was the first one issued, was signed by the President, Thomas Jefferson, and Edmund Randolph, the Attorney-General. February 21, 1793, another act was approved abolishing the joint agency and lodging the granting of patents in the Secretary of State, the Attorney-General, however, to examine the letters patent and pass upon their conformity to the act.2

In 1802 began the real formation of the Patent Office, with the assignment to the duty of superintending that part of the Department's business of a remarkable

11 Stat., 109. 21 Stat., 318.

and versatile character, Dr. William Thornton, who was styled Superintendent of Patents, and who contined in that office for twenty-six years, until his death March 28, 1828.1 He received his first government appointment in connection with the laying out of Washington in 1794. It appears from his letters that he had been a student at the University of Edinburgh, and in London and Paris, where he studied mineralogy under Faujas de St. Fond. His salary at first was $1,400 per annum, but was increased by Madison from October 24, 1808, to $2,000, until 1810, when inadequate appropriations compelled its reduction. In a memorial to the House of Representatives, dated March 21, 1818, he submitted an account for a balance due him of $4,186.18.3

His administration was marked by friction with the Secretary and inventors, the latter charging him with discrimination and personal interest in some of the patents issued. Among the most vigorous of these complainants was Robert Fulton, between whom and

1 No biography of Thornton exists, yet one would be an interesting contribution to history. He was the author of erudite pamphlets on speech and the origin of language, and invented a system of lip-reading. He collaborated with John Fitch in building a steamboat and invented the boiler which made Fitch's boat a success. He stamped his genius in architecture upon the capitol. He was a pioneer in the cause of negro emancipation and the colonization of free blacks in Africa. A great many of his papers are in the Department of State, especially among the applications for office, and the papers which he left are in the Library of Congress.

2 Thornton to J. Q. Adams, September 15, 1820; to Jefferson, January 8, 1821; to Madison, January 20, 1821. Dept. of State MSS., applications for office.

3 Dept. of State MSS., Miscl. Letters.

Thornton a bitter feud arose. Fulton, in a letter dated December 27, 1814, wrote the Secretary, asking that patents granted Thornton be annulled, as they were infringements on his inventions and that Thornton be dismissed from office. On December 23, 1814, Thornton had petitioned for a patent for an improvement in the application of steam to flutter or paddle wheels on the sides of a boat. Fulton's request was granted in part, and Thornton was prohibited from taking out any patents while he held the office of Superintendent, a verdict against which he protested vigorously and which was withdrawn. He described the vexation of his situation in a letter to Secretary J. Q. Adams, December 13, 1817, saying:

I have hopes if there be a purgatory, that the Superintendt of the Patent office will be exempt from many sufferings in consequence of the dire situation he has experienced on earth.3

The method of procedure required the applications to be made to the Superintendent, who passed upon them and then submitted the question of issuing the patents to the Secretary of State, and applicants who were dissatisfied with the Superintendent's ruling appealed from them to the Secretary of State.*

Upon Thornton's death, Thomas P. Jones was appointed the Superintendent, and he in turn was succeeded by Dr. John D. Craig in 1830. Craig was the first to make an orderly arrangement by subjects of the drawings and models in his charge, but his 1 Dept. of State MSS., Miscl. Letters.

2 Thornton MSS., Lib. Cong.

3 Dept. of State MSS., Miscl. Letters. 4 Ibid.

methods of business were so irregular that an official investigation became necessary in 1833. He was censured and a number of new rules for conducting his office were laid down.

In 1810, by Act of April 28, Congress authorized the moving of the office to a new building which was to be erected, and April 11, 1816, President Madison recommended the establishment of a distinct patent office under the Department of State, with an adequate salary for the Director.1 Additional quarters were provided for in 1828, and in 1836 the Patent Office building was ordered to be built."

The title of Superintendent, which Thornton held by courtesy, was not recognized by law until April 23, 1830, when the salary was fixed at $1,500. The whole system underwent modification, and all previous acts were repealed by the Act of July 4, 1836, which created the office of Commissioner of Patents, under the Department of State, provided for a chief clerk, authorized the designing and using of a separate seal, and specified minutely how patents were to be applied for, granted, etc. All patents were to be signed by the Secretary of State, and countersigned by the Commissioner of Patents. In 1849, when the Department of the Interior was formed, the Patent Office became a part of it and all the records were transferred as the act required. It had, for all practical

1 Messages and Papers of the President, 1: 571.

2 4 Stat., 303, V, 115.

3 4 Stat., 396.

45 Stat., 117, et seq.