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APPENDIX No. XXL11.
Legislature last Session, has loft inventors a proy to extortionate and oppressive foes for letterspatent, which practically prevent them from obtaining that protection for their labour, thought,and skill which society is bound to afford them in return for the benefit of receiving a disclo-sure of their inventions. The protection given by tho Act will expiro, as to some parties, ontho 22nd of April, and as to about 300 on the 1st of May, and as to tho remainder at variousdates, from the 1st of May to the 13th of October 1852.
It is a matter worthy of consideration whether some short Act of Parliament should not bopassed at once before tho 22nd of April 1852, extending tho term of protection for somefurther definite period, or at least to the end of the present Session of Parliament, in tho hopethat some cheaper and more simple system of patent law may in the meantime bo established.Unless something of this kind bo done, a great injustice is committed towards tho applicantsunder this Act. They exhibited their inventions ; they disclosed them to tho public in thoconfident hopo (I might almost say under a pledge) that before their protection expired theywould bo onabled easily ami cheaply to perfect their rights under a new and improved systemof patent law, and without which many would never have risked the disclosure. Indeed, ifthis bo not done this Act of Parliament will become to many, and from the naturo of the caseto the most meritorious, inventors, “ a mockery, a delusion, and a snare.”
Tho experience of tho working of the Act shows how gladly inventors availed themselves oftho privilege afforded them ; and leads me to believe that, if this principle of provisional pro-tection form, as 1 trust it will, a part of any now patent law, some arrangements should be madefor establishing a permanent public place of deposit for the exhibition of inventions as a kindof Museum of Invention, a truo “ Inventors’ Mart,” as suggested by M. 1). Hill, Esip, Q. 0., inhis Letter of 4th November 1850 to the Mayor of Birmingham . It would bring the inventormoro readily into communication with the capitalist, and at the same time afford a moreextended means of arriving at a just estimate of his invention. It would, coupled with acomplete system of indices and publication of specifications, render essential service toinventors in checking that prevalent vice of the present system, tho creation of invalid legalrights, in placing tho inventor loss at tho mercy of tho capitalist, and in protecting tho unedu-cated inventor from the evils of his own ignorance ; whilst tho public would bo benefited bytho stimulus to inventive genius, such an Exhibition cannot fail to exert, and by the savingthat time, thought, labour, and money, which now, owing to the secrecy unavoidable underthe present system, is so often fruitlessly spent in retracing and reinventing tho results ofprevious ingenuity.
Whether such an Exhibition, arising out of a now patent law system, should be under thosuperintendence of Government or otherwise, is a matter for consideration ; but in any case1 am satisfied that inventors would readily pay for tho privilege of depositing their inven-tions in some building for that purpose, and that such au institution would bo self-supporting.It is no doubt true that all inventions might not bo capable of being so deposited, might notbo sufficiently matured for that purpose, and for other reasons ; but still this affords no suffi-cient argument against the establishment of such an institution, nor is it a valid argumentagainst the system of provisional protection to say it is only practically applicable to sucharticles as are sufficiently matured to exhibit. In the caso of what I may call an immatureinvention, it would only render tho examination of tho provisional specification a work ofgreater responsibility and requiring greater care. Tho protection afforded would bo tho same,'and tho benefit to tho inventor and tho public equally extensive ; and, in my opinion, if sucha system had a tendency to limit the number of immature inventions, for which letters patentare at present too readily obtained by those who are rich enough to pay tho fees, tho propertyin inventions would be rather benefited than not, and tho honest and painstaking inventorwould reap his reward against him who now obtains protection for a crudo and immaturenotion, which ho is incapable of bringing to practical completion, and which, wliilo protectedis an injury to tho public by standing in tho way of, and chocking, tho further progress ofinvention.
Peter Le Neve Foster.
92, Chancery Lane, 23rd February 1852.
To Her Majesty's Commissioners for the Nxhibiiion of theWorks of Industry of all Nations .1851.