It is, in fact, a general expatriation, like the one that followed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. It is worthy of remark that in Germany there are twelve Patents for making colours or dyes from aniline; in England there are fourteen, in France (thanks to the interpretation given to the law) there is one. “Et nunc caveant consules.”
T. N. Benard.
[6] Extract of a paper on the subject in the Propriété Industrielle.
II.
In our number of November 1, 1862, we published on this very same question an article in which we stated that about twenty French manufacturers had been forced to go abroad to escape the unheard-of exigencies of the law of Patents. We were answered by insults that we disdained; but the facts that we had revealed were not contested.
A volume just published on the legislation and the jurisprudence of the law of Patents enables us to show another side of the question, and to prove how injurious it is to manufacturers and inventors, and how profitable to certain gentlemen of the Bar who have the speciality of cases for infringement on Patents. We say it openly and fearlessly, if it was not for the lawyers who swim freely amongst the windings of that law, it would not have a supporter. Manufacturers and inventors are shamelessly made a prey to a group of pleaders who defend right and wrong with the same deplorable alacrity.
What an immense number of law-suits have arisen from the 54 articles of that law! The volume we have in hand has been written with the intention of giving to the public a view of the jurisprudence adopted by the Courts in the interpretation of each paragraph. A summary of the trials that have taken place since its promulgation in 1844 follows each article of the law.
Article I. is as follows: “Every new discovery or invention, in all kinds of industry, ensures to its author, under the conditions and for the time hereafter determined, the exclusive right to work for his benefit the said discovery or invention. This right is established by documents granted by the Government, and called Patents.”
The first trial that we find in the list took place in 1844. The question was, Whether the words all kinds of industry could be applied to things that are not in trade? The Court’s decision was for the affirmative.