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37 J. Pat. Off. Soc'y 467 (1955)
Judicial Construction of the Patent Act of 1954 - Codification v. Substantive Change

handle is hein.journals/jpatos37 and id is 493 raw text is: Judicial Construction of The Patent Act of 1952-Codification v. Substantive Change By WILLIAM W. BECKETT INTRODUCTION In the Patent Act of 1952,1 Congress for the first time assembled substantially all of the patent laws of the United States into one statutory package. Many of the provisions of the Act incorporate language which is new. In some instances the language of the At appears merely to re-state and clarify the corresponding pre-existing statutory law. In other instances the language has no counterpart in the prior statutes but appears to codify judicial decisions. In still other instances the language, on its face, appears to have no counterpart in the prior statutes, to be in direct conflict with decisions of the courts and therefore to change the law. In applying the new law, the courts and the Patent. Office are forced to decide whether or not case law built up prior to the act is applicable. In determining, this problem, the tribunals are faced with the threshold question of whether the new Act or at least the section which they are considering merely codifies the pre- existing law or embodies substantive changes in the prior law. A degree of confusion as to this question exists among the decisions. This confusion stems largely from a contradictory legislative history leading to the Act's passage. Broad general statements referring to the Act as a whole, made on both sides of the question on the floor of the Senate and in the committee reports, provide the basis for most of the confusion. Of course the cases are largely concerned with some individual section of the Act rather than the Act as a whole, and difficulty arises when the section in question embodies new statutory language. There is marked con- troversy centering around several particular sections, 135 U. S. C. (1952). -467-

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