PROCEEDINGS ON APPLICATIONS FOR PATENTS, AND ON APPEALS FROM DECISIONS OF THE COMMISSIONER.
SEC. 29. 'That on the filing of any such application (consisting of petition, specification, model, and drawings, or specimens,) and the payment of the duty hereinafter provided, the Commissioner shall make, or cause to be made, an examination, of the alleged new invention or discovery; and if, on any such examination, it shall not appear to the Commissioner that the same had been invented or discovered by any other person in this country prior to the alleged invention or discovery thereof by the applicant, or that it had been patented or described in any printed publication in this or any foreign country, or had been in public use or on sale, with the applicant's consent or allowance, prior to the application, if the Commissioner shall deem it to be sufficiently useful and important, it shall be his duty to issue a patent therefor. But whenever on such examination it shall appear to the Commissioner that the applicant was not the original and first inventor or discoverer thereof, or that any part of that which is claimed as new had before been invented or discovered or patented, or described in any printed publication in this or any foreign country as aforesaid, or that the description is defective and insufficient, he shall notify the applicant thereof, giving him briefly such information and references as may be useful in judging of the propriety of renewing his application, or of altering his specification to embrace only that part of the invention or discovery which is new. In every such case, if the applicant shall elect to withdraw his application, relinquishing his claim to the model, he shall be entitled to receive back twenty dollars, part of the duty required by this act, on filing a notice in writing of such election in the Patent Office; a copy of which, certified by the Commissioner, shall be a sufficient warrant to the Treasurer for paying back to the said applicant the said sum of twenty dollars. But if the applicant, in such case, shall persist in his claim for a patent, with or without any alteration his specification, he shall be required to make oath or affirmation anew, in manner as aforesaid; and if specification and claim shall not have been so modified as, in the opinion of the Commissioner, shall entitle the applicant to a patent, he may appeal to the Chief Justice of the United States Court for the District of Columbia, who may affirm or reverse the decision of the Commissioner of Patents, in whole or in part, and may order a patent to issue; or he may have remedy against the decision of the Commissioner of Patents, or the decision of the Chief Justice of the United States Court for the District of Columbia, by filing a bill in equity in any of the United States Courts having jurisdiction, as hereinafter explained.
