Invention in the New Republic: Thomas Jefferson, Administrator of the First U.S. Patent Law, Writes Mentioning the First Two Patents Granted in the United States

An unpublished letter, just discovered and not previously known to exist

From the very beginning of the Republic, the Founding Fathers were concerned with promoting invention and the advancement of technology. They inserted in the Constitution of the United States, at Article I, Section 8, a provision that “The Congress shall have Power…to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.”

After the new government was inaugurated in 1789, President George Washington saw the importance of creating a patent system. On January 8, 1790, during his first State of the Union, he called on Congress to establish such a system. Washington said, “The advancement of Agriculture, commerce and Manufactures, by all proper means, will not, I trust, need recommendation.”

The First Congress lost no time in effectuating this encouragement of invention in the new nation, and on April 1, 1790, the first U.S. Patent Act was passed. It was entitled “An Act to promote the Progress of Useful Arts”, a title that stated clearly its purpose. In the Patent Act of 1790, the power to grant or refuse patents was given exclusively to a Board consisting of three people: the Secretary of State, who was Thomas Jefferson, and whose job it also was to administer the patent process and prepare the patents; the Secretary of War, Henry Knox; and the Attorney General, Edmund Randolph. Patent applicants needed the consent of at least two of the three officials to obtain a patent. The act provided that an examination process be carried out by the same three officials to decide whether the inventions were “not before known or used” and “sufficiently useful and important”.

First, each inventor had to submit to the Secretary of State “a specification in writing, containing a description” of their creation. The Patent Board needed to fully understand each invention they evaluated. The act also required a model be submitted, along with the description, if the invention could be represented with one. It cost between 50 cents and $5 to pursue obtaining a patent, depending on its difficulty.

Three patents were granted in 1790, the first two within one week of each other. The first was issued on July 31 to Samuel Hopkins, for his invention of “Making Pot and Pearl Ashes.” Potash was used as an ingredient in several fields of manufacturing, such as making glass and soap, dying cloth, and producing both saltpeter and gunpowder. The patent stated that Hopkins “discovered an Improvement, not known or used before, such Discovery, in the making of Pot ash and Pearl ash by a new Apparatus and Process; that is to say, in the making of Pearl ash 1st by burning the raw Ashes in a Furnace, 2d by dissolving and boiling them when so burnt in Water, 3rd by drawing off and settling the Ley, and 4th by boiling the Ley into Salts which then are the true Pearl ash; and also in the making of Pot ash by fluxing the Pearl ash so made as aforesaid; which Operation of burning the raw Ashes in a Furnace, preparatory to their Dissolution and boiling in Water, is new, leaves little Residuum; and produces a much greater Quantity of Salt”. President Washington signed the patent.

Just a week later, the second patent was issued to famed Boston candlemaker Joseph Stacey Sampson on August 6, 1790. It was for an invention aiding in the “manufacturing of candles.” Later on, Sampson invented the continuous burning wick, a landmark in lighting in the era of candles. Only one other patent was issued in 1790, and that was in December.

Autograph letter signed, Philadelphia, September 6, 1790, to his aide Henry Remsen. “I enclose you a patent in the case of Mr. Sampson which needs the great seal, as also the endorsement of the time of delivery, which be pleased to make over my signature on the back, in the form used in Hopkins’ case, and dating it the day you deliver the patent…” On the verso in Jefferson’s hand is written the addressee, “Henry Remsen, New York”. Remsen went on to serve as Jefferson’s private secretary during his presidency. This letter is unpublished, and was unknown to history until we turned it up recently as part of a collection put together a half century ago.

This is the only letter of Jefferson relating to the first patents we have ever seen, and a search of public sale records going back forty years fails to turn up any with the 1790 date. This is thus one of the foundation letters of the law of invention in the United States.

Since these two in the summer of 1790, to date 10 million patents have been issued in the United States. Patents are administered by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.