Patent Act of 1790
The Patent Act of 1790 was the United States’ first federal patent law. It became law on April 10, 1790, about a year after the Constitution was ratified. The act defined a patent as covering any useful art, manufacture, engine, machine, or device, or any new improvement, and it gave the inventor exclusive rights to making, using, and selling the invention in the United States.
The act came out of discussions about patents for imported inventions. It did not grant patents for importation.
A three‑person Patent Board, also called the Commissioners for the Promotion of Useful Arts, decided whether to grant a patent. The Board consisted of the Secretary of State, the Secretary of War, and the Attorney General. The first members included Thomas Jefferson, Henry Knox, and Edmund Randolph. They judged whether the invention was sufficiently useful and important before granting a patent.
Getting a patent cost about four to five dollars in total. The filing fee was 50 cents plus ten cents for every 100 words of the specification; two dollars to produce the patent document; one dollar for the Great Seal; and twenty cents for endorsements and other services. A patent could last up to fourteen years, as set by the Patent Board.
The act was administered by the Department of State, where records were kept and filings received. The Patent Board met from time to time and sometimes held hearings where an inventor could present their case in person. The process was slow.
The act aimed to protect inventions in the “useful Arts,” typically the work of skilled workers in engineering and manufacturing. At first, patents required an examination, but this requirement was dropped by the 1793 act. Inventors had to submit a written specification describing the invention in a way that would let a skilled person use it, including drawings or models if possible. Applicants did not have to swear an oath.
Infringement cases were decided by a jury. If someone copied a patent, they had to surrender the infringing items, and the patent could be repealed within a year if found infringing. If a patent case went to trial and the claimant lost, they had to pay the costs.
Between 1790 and 1793, 57 patents were granted. Three were issued in 1790, 33 in 1791, 11 in 1792, and 10 in 1793 before the next patent law. Records from the Patent Office were mostly destroyed in the 1836 Patent Office Fire, so many details are missing. The first patent was issued on July 31, 1790, to a Samuel Hopkins for “Making Pot and Pearl Ashes.” There is some confusion about which Samuel Hopkins received the patent; one Hopkins was from Vermont, but the patent was issued to a Hopkins from near Baltimore, Maryland.
Other early patents included Oliver Evans’s December 18, 1790 patent for flour‑related inventions, and Francis Bailey’s January 29, 1791 patent for punches used in printing type; Bailey’s is the oldest surviving copy. Bailey’s patent was signed by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Edmund Randolph.
Why the act changed: the examination process was slow and criticized, including by Jefferson. Congress removed the examination requirement three years after the act, so inventions no longer had to be deemed “sufficiently useful and important” to receive a patent. The system shifted toward granting patents with no mandatory examination.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 07:27 (CET).