Statute of Monopolies 1623
England's Statute of Monopolies of 1623 (21 Jac. 1, c.3), while generally condemning monopolies, provided the true and first inventor of a given item up to fourteen years of exclusive rights to their invention, provided that: ...“they be not contrary to the law nor mischievous to the state by raising prices of commodities at home, or hurt of trade, or generally inconvenient.”
Before that, in 1474 the Republic of Venice issued a decree by which new and inventive devices, once they had been put into practice, had to be communicated to the Republic in order to obtain legal protection against potential infringers.
Statute text
The statute was composed to lay down a general rule and then certain exceptions. The rule thus read,
"All Monopolies and all Commissions, Grants, Licences, Charters and Letters Patent heretofore made or granted or hereafter to be made or granted to any Person or Persons, Bodies Politick or Corporate whatsoever, of, or for the sole Buying, Sellin, Making, Working or Using any Thing within this Realm... or of any other Monopolies, or of Power, Liberty or Faculty... are altogether contrary to the Laws of this Realm, and so are and shall be utterly void and of none effect and in no wise to be put into use or execution.
The seemingly broad scope of this rule was made virtually toothless however by the exceptions.
1. "Provided nevertheless, and be it declared an enacted That any Declaration beforementioned, shall not extend to any Letters Patents and Grants of Privilege for the Term of one and Twenty Years, or under, heretofore made of the sole Working or Making of any Manner of new Manufacture within this Realm, to the first true Inventor or Inventors of such Manufactures which others at the time of the Making of such Letters Patents Grants did not use, so they be not contrary to the Law, nor mischievous to the State, by Raising of the Prices of Commodities at home, or Hurt by Trade, or generally inconvenient."
2. "This Act or anything therein contained, shall not in any wise extend, or be prejudicial... unto any Corporations, Companies or Fellowships of any Art, Trade, Occupation or Mystery, or to any Companies or Societies of Merchants within this Realm, erected for the Maintenance, Enlargement, or Ordering of any Trade or Merchandise; but that the same Charters, Customs, Corporations, Companies, Fellowships and Societies and their Liberties, Privileges, Powers and Immunities shall be and continue of such Force and Effect as they were before the Making of this Act, and of none other ; any Thing before in this Act contained to the contrary or any wise notwithstanding."
Situation prior to the statute
Prior to the statute, the crown would issue letters patent providing any person with a "monopoly" to produce particular goods or provide particular services:
The first of them was granted by Henry VI in 1449 to a Flemish man a 20 year monopoly (co-incidentally, the current length of UK/EU patents is still 20 years) on the manufacture of stained glass (destined for Eton College). This was the start of a long tradition by the English Crown of the granting of "letters patent" (meaning 'open letter', as opposed to a letter under seal) which granted "monopolies" to favoured persons (or people who were prepared to pay for them). This became increasingly open to abuse as the Crown granted patents in respect of all sorts of known goods (salt, for example).
This power, which was to raise money for the crown, was widely abused, and court began to limit the circumstances in which they could be granted. After public outcry, James I was forced to revoke all existing monopolies and declare that they were only to be used for 'projects of new invention'. This was incorporated into the Statute of Monopolies in which Parliament restricted the crown's power explicitly so that the King could only issue letters patents to the inventors or introducers of original inventions for a fixed number of years.
Follow-up
In the reign of Queen Anne the rules were changed again so that a written description of the article was given.
Section 6 of the Statute refers to "manner[s] of new manufacture... [by] inventors", and this section remains the foundation for patent law in New Zealand and Australia. The Statute of Monopolies was later developed by the courts to produce modern patent law; this innovation was soon adopted by other countries.
In the United Kingdom, the Patents Act 1977 harmonised UK patent law with the European Patent Convention. Consequently, UK patent law is no longer based on the Statute of Monopolies.
See also
External links
- Official text of the Statute of Monopolies 1623 as amended and in force today within the United Kingdom, from the UK Statute Law Database
- Original text of Statute of Monopolies
- Original text of the statute (scroll down to (D)) from another source
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