You are accordingly instructed to bring the subject to the attention of the
foreign office with the request that the publication suggested by the
Commissioner of Patents may be made with as little delay as possible.
[Inclosure in No. 409.]
Mr. Chandler to Mr.
Blaine.
Department of the Interior,
Washington, April 25, 1892.
(Received April 27.)
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the
receipt of your letter of the 18th instant, transmitting copy of a
letter from Messers. Howson & Howson of the 11th instant, stating
“that patents issued to American inventors in German are of doubtful
validity, owing to the fact that there has not as yet been published hi
the German Imperial Official Gazette the specific notification required
as to the reciprocal rights granted by the United Suites to German
inventors.”
In reply I have the honor to inclose a copy of a letter addressed by
Examiner Seely to the Commissioner of Patents and favorably indorsed by
him. The Commissioner of Patents remarks that “the German Government
should be earnestly asked for the immediate publication in the German
Imperial Gazette of the specific not ideation referred to in the letter
of the honorable Secretary of State.”
Very respectfully,
Geo. Chandler,
Acting Secretary.
[Inclosure in inclosure in No.
400.]
Mr. Seely to Mr.
Simonds.
United
states Patent Office, April
23, 1892.
Sir: I have the honor to return herewith the
letter of the 18th instant from the Secretary of State to the Secretary
of the Interior, inclosing a copy of a letter from Messrs. Howson &
Howson, of Philadelphia, regarding the conditions of the existing German
law which renders invalid patents granted for inventions previously
patented in this country, and to say that the conditions, as correctly
stated by Messrs. Howson, are operating to the serious disadvantage of
American patentees.
This is not by reason of any obscurity in the law, but is due apparently
to careless reading of it, since it is expressly provided in the law
that the exemption from having the right in Germany defeated by a prior
printed publication is only to be claimed by citizens of states giving
the same privilege to Germans, when that fact has been officially
published in the Imperial Gazette. Many Americans have overlooked this
last condition, and lawyers have even advised their clients that they
might safely apply for patents in Germany after their domestic patents
had been granted. I have always warned those with whom I have talked
against this misapprehension, and have twice called attention to it
through the press, but it still continues.
On March 19, 1891, in a letter to your predecessor I called attention to
the new German law which was to go into force on October 1 following,
and recommended that the subject be brought before the Secretary of
State that steps might be taken as early as possible to have this
official publication made on behalf of the United States for the benefit
of American inventors. This letter, as I understood at the time, was
duly transmitted to the Secretary of State, and I afterwards learned
that the matter was brought to the attention of the United States
minister at Berlin.
The only outcome hitherto so far as I know is in the proposition from
Germany through her chargé d’affaires at this capital for a convention
between the two Governments concerning patents and trade-marks. In the
draft presented the three months’ limit is extended to six months, which
would be for our decided advantage.
[Page 188]
The form of convention was, however, not entirely
in consonance with our law, and some modifications were proposed on our
side, concerning which the determination of Germany has not been heard
so far as I am informed.
As the German Parliament was to adjourn at Easter, the proposed
convention may have failed of adoption.
In this contingency, and pending the adoption of a convention of some
kind, I would respectfully recommend that the German Government he
solicited to place the United States on the list of governments whose
citizens may reap the benefit of section 2 of its patent law, and of
section 13 of the law of June 1, 1891, on the ground that this
Government does by law afford corresponding privileges to German
subjects.
I have, etc.,
