Patent Law Quotes

Next came the Patent laws. These began in England in 1624; and, in this country, with the adoption of our constitution. Before then [these?], any man might instantly use what another had invented; so that the inventor had no special advantage from his own invention. The patent system changed this; secured to the inventor, for a limited time, the exclusive use of his invention; and thereby added the fuel of interest to the fire of genius, in the discovery and production of new and useful things.

Abraham Lincoln

Country, Science, Men

Second lecture on discoveries and inventions, delivered to the Phi Alpha Society of Illinois College at Jacksonville, Illinois, (February 11, 1859); "The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, Vol. 3" edited by Roy P. Basler, (p. 357), 1953.

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In the world's history certain inventions and discoveries occurred, of peculiar value, on account of their great efficiency in facilitating all other inventions and discoveries. Of these were the art of writing and of printing - the discovery of America, and the introduction of Patent-laws. The date of the first ... is unknown; but it certainly was as much as fifteen hundred years before the Christian era; the second-printing-came in 1436, or nearly three thousand years after the first. The others followed more rapidly - the discovery of America in 1492, and the first patent laws in 1624.

Abraham Lincoln

Christian, Art, Writing

"Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 3" by Abraham Lincoln, New Brunswick, N.J: Rutgers University Press, 1953.

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A country without a patent office and good patent laws is just a crab, and can't travel any way but sideways and backways.

Mark Twain

Country, Law, Office

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The US patent system adds the fuel of interest to the fire of genius in the discovery and production of new and useful things

Abraham Lincoln

Fire, Discovery, Patents

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That reminds me to remark, in passing, that the very first official thing I did, in my administration-and it was on the first day of it, too-was to start a patent office; for I knew that a country without a patent office and good patent laws was just a crab, and couldn't travel any way but sideways or backways.

Mark Twain

Country, Science, Law

Mark Twain (2012). “Three by Twain: Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and A Connecticut Yankee In King Arther's Court”, p.63, Graphic Arts Books

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Patent law holds us back, in every which way, shape or form. There is place for it, in physical products, in pharmaceuticals, but in software in particular, there is no place for it.

Mark Cuban

Law, Patents, Shapes

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While the Nation has forbidden monopoly by one set of laws it has been creating them by another. Patent laws, valuable as they may be in some respects, often father monopoly.

Robert H. Jackson

Father, Law, Creating

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As the commercial confrontation between [free software] and software-that's-a-product becomes more fierce, patent law's going to be the terrain on which a big piece of the war's going to be fought. Waterloo is here somewhere.

Eben Moglen

War, Law, Patents

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