[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 97 (Tuesday, June 12, 2018)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E827]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              RECOGNIZING MAY AS NATIONAL INVENTORS MONTH

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                           HON. PAUL A. GOSAR

                               of arizona

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, June 12, 2018

  Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Speaker, if any single thing epitomizes American 
ingenuity, it is the iconic American inventor. It is our distinct 
pleasure, therefore, to give special recognition to the month of May as 
National Inventors Month.
  President Lincoln considered how ``certain inventions and discoveries 
[in history] occurred of peculiar value, on account of their great 
efficiency in facilitating all other inventions and discoveries.'' Mr. 
Lincoln specified ``the art of writing and of printing; the discovery 
of America, and the introduction of patent laws.'' Today, we might 
refer to such inventions and discoveries as ``disruptive 
technologies.''
  National Inventors Month, 2018, it is well worth considering 
President Lincoln's exaltation of invention and, by implication, of 
inventors. Moreover, we as a nation should pause to reflect why the 
Sixteenth President of the United States connected patent laws with 
invention and ``disruptive'' advancements. Notably, he even placed 
patenting of inventions on par with the discovery of America and the 
invention of the printing press. In the same lecture titled 
``Discoveries, Inventions, and Improvements,'' President Lincoln 
observed, ``Before then any man [might] instantly use what another man 
had invented, so that the inventor had no special advantage from his 
invention. The patent system changed this, secured to the inventor for 
a limited time exclusive use of his inventions . . . .''
  Not only President Lincoln, but the Founders held this belief about 
securing patent rights to the intellectual fruits of one's labor. The 
Founders thought it important enough to empower and encourage invention 
by any American so inclined, in order to advance our nation's 
collective knowledge and economic strength, that they included this 
very special, exclusive property right within the Constitution itself. 
Thus, our Founders deliberately intended to stimulate invention by 
inventors from sea to shining sea--be they on farms, in factories, 
toiling in their basements, barns, garages, in corporate research and 
development facilities, in the laboratories of companies and of our 
world-class universities.
  President Lincoln, who has been the only U.S. president with a 
patent, summarized this famous, successful formula. He credited our 
patent system for its securing inventors' exclusive rights to use their 
inventions as they see fit. He phrased this famously, completing the 
thought in the same speech. Mr. Lincoln said U.S. patents ``added the 
fuel of interest to the fire of genius in the discovery and production 
of new and useful things.''
  Therefore, we proudly recognize National Inventors Month. I encourage 
my fellow Americans to take this opportunity to reflect on the great 
benefits we daily enjoy from the inventions, great and small, of 
American inventors.

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