The value of our patent system is eloquently outlined by Senator Platt, of Connecticut. In speaking on a bill for the reorganization of the Patent Office, he said:

"To my mind, the passage of the act of 1836 creating the Patent Office marks the most important epoch in the history of our development - I think the most important event in the history of our Government from the Constitution until the Civil War. The establishment of the Patent Office marked the commencement of that marvelous development of the resources of the country which is the admiration and wonder of the world, a development which challenges all history for a parallel; and it is not too much to say that this unexampled progress has been not only dependent upon, but has been coincident with, the growth and development of the patent system of this country. Words fail in attempting to portray the advancement of this country for the last fifty years. We have had fifty years of progress, fifty years of inventions applied to the every-day wants of life, fifty years of patent encouragement, and fifty years of a development in wealth, resources, grandeur, culture, power which is little short of miraculous. Population, production, business, wealth, comfort, culture, power, grandeur, these have all kept step with the expansion of the inventive genius of the country; and this progress has been made possible only by the inventions of its citizens. All history confirms us in the conclusion that it is the development by the mechanical arts of the industries of a country which brings to it greatness and power and glory. No purely agricultural, pastoral people ever achieved any high standing among the nations of the earth. It is only when the brain evolves and the cunning hand fashions labor-saving machines that a nation begins to throb with new energy and life and expands with a new growth. It is only when thought wrings from nature her untold secret treasures that solid wealth and strength are accumulated by a people."

When the Japanese Government was considering the establishment of a patent system, they sent a commissioner to the United States and he spent several months in Washington, every facility being given him by the Commissioner of Patents. One of the examiners said: "I would like to know why it is that the people of Japan desire to have a patent system."

"I will tell you," said Mr. Takahashi. "You know it is only since Commodore Perry, in 1854, opened the ports of Japan to foreign commerce that the Japanese have been trying to become a great nation, like other nations of the earth, and we have looked about us to see what nations are the greatest, so that we could be like them; and we said, 'There is the United States, not much more than a hundred years old, and America was not discovered by Columbus yet four hundred years ago'; and we said, 'What is it that makes the United States such a great nation?' And we investigated, and we found it was patents, and we will have patents."

The examiner, in reporting this interview, added: "Not in all history is there an instance of such unbiased testimony to the value and worth of the patent system as practiced in the United States."

The demonstration thus given the commercial world during the last half century of the effect of beneficent patent laws has led to their modification in all the chief industrial countries, and the salient feature of our system - a preliminary examination as to novelty and patentability prior to the grant of a patent - has in late years been incorporated into the patent systems of many foreign countries, as, for instance, Austria, Canada, Denmark, Germany. Japan, Norway, Russia, Sweden, and Switzerland.

The discoverer of new products of value in the arts and the inventor of new processes, or improved machines, adds to public wealth, and his right to the product of his brain is now recognized by the laws of all civilized nations. The word "patent" had its origin in royal grants to favored subjects of monopolies in trade or manufacture; but now the word is used in a restricted sense to cover improvements in inventions. A few patents for inventions were granted by the provincial governments of the American colonies and by the legislatures of the States, prior to the adoption of the