[No. XVIII. ] 1 James II. c. 17.-An Act for reviving and Continuance of several Acts of Parliament therein mentioned [No. XIX. ] 4 William & Mary, c. 2.-An Act that the Inhabitants of the Pro- vince of York may dispose of their Personal Estates by their Wills, notwith- [No. XX. ] 4 & 5 William & Mary, c. 24.-An Act for reviving, continuing, and explaining several Laws therein mentioned, which are expired and near expir- [No. XXI.] 7 & 8 William III. c. 38.-An Act to take away the Custom of Wales which binders Persons from disposing their Personal Estates by their Wills 362 [No. XXII.] 2 & 3 Anne, c. 5.—An Act to repeal a Proviso in an Act of the Fourth Year of the Reign of King William and Queen Mary, which prevents the Citizens of the City of York from disposing of their personal Estates by their Wills, as others inhabiting within the Province of York by that Act may do 363 [No. XXIII.] 4 & 5 Anne, c. 16.-An Act for the Amendment of the Law, and the better advancement of Justice [No. XXIV. ] 11 George I. c. 18.-An Act for regulating Elections within the City of London, and for preserving the Peace, good Order and Government of [No. XXV.] 25 George II. c. 6.-An Act for avoiding and putting an End to certain Doubts and Questions relating to the attestation of Wills and Codicils Concerning real Estates in that Part of Great Britain called England, and in [No. XXVI. ] 38 George III. c. 87.-An Act for the Administration of Assets in Cases where the Executor to whom Probate has been granted is out of the [ XXVII. ] 58 George III. c. 81.-An Act for extending to that part of the United Kingdom called Ireland certain provisions of the Parliament of Great Britain, in relation to Executors under the age of Twenty-one Years, and to Matrimonial [No. XXVIII.] 4 George IV. c. 98.-An Act for the better granting of Confirma- ib. A COLLECTION OF THE STATUTES, &c. &c. &c. PART III. Personal Property and Contracts. CLASS 1. Patents, Literary Property, &c. 2. Trade, Navigation, Ship-Owners, Mariners and PATENTS, LITERARY PROPERTY, PROPERTY IN PRINTS, [No. I. ] 21 James I. c. 3.-An Act concerning Mono- FORASMUCH as your most excellent Majesty in your royal judg- 21 Jac. I. c. 3. ment and of your blessed disposition to the weal and quiet of your All Monopolies, subjects did in the year of our Lord God one thousand six hundred and &c. shall be ten publish in print to the whole realm and to all posterity, that all void. 'grants and monopolies and of the benefit of any penal laws or of power Stile, 214. to dispense with the law or to compound for the forfeiture are contrary 3 Inst. 181, 'to your Majesty's laws, which your Majesty's declaration is truly consonant 182, 183. and agreeable to the ancient and fundamental laws of this your realm: 1 Haw. P. C. And whereas your Majesty was further graciously pleased expressly to P. 230, & se'command that no suitor should presume to move your Majesty for mat- quent. 'ters of that nature; yet nevertheless upon misinformations and untrue 'pretences of public good many such grants have been unduly obtained and unlawfully put in execution to the great grievance and inconve VOL. II. B No. I. 21 Jac. I. c. 3. 3 Mod. 131. Monopolies, &c. shall be tried by the Common Laws of this Realm. All Persons disabled to use Monopolies, &c. The Party grieved by Pretext of a Monopoly, &c. shall recover treble Damages and double Costs. 6 'nience of your Majesty's subjects, contrary to the laws of this your 'realm and contrary to your Majesty's most royal and blessed intention so published as aforesaid:' For avoiding whereof and preventing of the like in time to come, May it please your excellent Majesty, at the humble suit of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled, that it may be declared and enacted; and be it declared and enacted by authority of this present Parliament, That all monopolies and all commissions grants licences charters and letters patents 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 selling making working or using of any thing within this realm or the dominion of Wales, or of any other monopolies or of power liberty or faculty to dispense with any others, or to give licence or toleration to do use or exercise any thing against the tenor or purport of any law or statute; or to give or make any warrant for any such dispensation licence or toleration to be had or made; or to agree or compound with any others for any penalty or forfeitures limited by any statute; or or of any grant or promise of the benefit profit or commodity of any forfeiture penalty or sum of money that is or shall be due by any statute before judgment thereupon had; and all proclamations inhibitions restraints warrants of assistance and all other matters and things whatsoever, any way tending to the instituting erecting strengthening furthering or countenancing of the same or any of them, 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 in ure or execution. II. And be it further declared and enacted by the authority aforesaid, That all monopolies and all such commissions grants licences charters letters patents proclamations inhibitions restraints warrants of assistance and all other matters and things tending as aforesaid, and the force and validity of them and of every of them ought to be and shall be for ever hereafter examined heard tried and determined by and according to the common laws of this realm and not otherwise. III. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That all person and persons bodies politick and corporate whatsoever, which now are or hereafter shall be, shall stand and be disabled and uncapable to have use exercise or put in ure any monopoly or any such commission grant licence charter letters patents proclamation inhibition restraint warrant of assistance or other matter or thing tending as aforesaid, or any liberty power or faculty grounded or pretended to be grounded upon them or any of them. IV. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That if any person or persons at any time after the end of forty days next after the end of this present session of Parliament shall be hindred grieved disturbed or disquieted, or his or their goods or chattels any way seized attached distrained taken carried away or detained by occasion or pretext of any monopoly or of any such commission grant licence power liberty faculty letters patents proclamation inhibition restraint warrant of assistance or other matter or thing tending as aforesaid, and will sue to be relieved in or for any of the premises; that then and in every such case the same person and persons shall and may have his and their remedy for the same at the common law by any action or actions to be grounded upon this statute; the same action and actions to be heard and determined in the courts of King's Bench Common Pleas and Exchequer or in any of them against him or them by whom he or they shall be so hindred grieved disturbed or disquieted, or against him or them by whom his or their goods or chattels shall be so seized attached distrained taken carried away or detained; wherein all and every such person and persons which shall be so hindred grieved disturbed or disquieted, or whose goods or chattels shall be so seized attached distrained taken carried away or detained, shall recover three times so much as the damages which he or they sustained by means or occasion of being so hindred grieved disturbed or disquieted, or by means of having his or their goods or chattels seized attached distrained taken carried away or detained and double costs; No. I. 21 Jac. I. c. 3. and in such suits or for the staying or delaying thereof, no essoign protection wager of law aid prayer privilege injunction or order of restraint shall be in any wise prayed granted admitted or allowed, nor any more than one imparlance: and if any person or persons shall after notice given that the action depending is grounded upon this statute, cause or procure any action at the common law grounded upon this statute to be He that delaystayed or delayed before judgment by colour or means of any order war- eth an Action rant power or authority, save only of the court wherein such action as grounded upon aforesaid shall be brought and depending, or after judgment had upon this Statut e insuch action shall cause or procure the execution of or upon any such curs a Præjudgment to be stayed or delayed by colour or means of any order war- munire. rant power or authority save only by writ of error or attaint; that then the said person and persons so offending shall incur and sustain the pains penalties and forfeitures ordained and provided by the statute of provision and præmunire made in the sixteenth year of the reign of King 16 R. 2. c. 5. Richard the Second. saved. V. Provided nevertheless and be it declared and enacted, That any Letters Patents declaration before mentioned shall not extend to any letters patents and to use new grants of privilege for the term of one-and-twenty years or under hereto- Manufactures fore made of the sole working or making of any manner of new manufacture within this realm to the first and true inventor or inventors of such manufactures which others at the time of the making of such letters patents and 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 of trade or generally inconvenient, but that the same shall be of such force as they were or should be if this Act had not been made and of none other and if the same were made for more than one-and-twenty years, that then the same for the term of one and twenty years only, to be accounted from the date of the first letters patents and grants thereof made, shall be of such force as they were or should have been if the same had been made but for term of one-and-twenty years only, and as if this Act had never been had or made and of none other. VI. Provided also and be it declared and enacted, That any declaration before-mentioned shall not extend to any letters patents and grants of privilege for the term of fourteen years or under, hereafter to be made, of the sole working or making of any manner of new manufactures within this realm to the true and first inventor and inventors of such manufactures, which others at the time of making such letters patents and grants shall not use, so as also 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: (1.) the said fourteen years to be accounted from the date of the first letters patents or grant of such privilege hereafter to be made, but that the same shall be of such force as they should be if this Act had never been made and of none other. (2.) (1.) A Patent was held void for an invention by which more Caps and Bonnets could be thickened by a fulling mill in one day than by the labour of fourteen men who got their livings by it, on the ground of its being inconvenient to turn so many labouring men to idleness-3 Inst. 184. This mode of contemplating the effect of machinery to shorten labour is a fair specimen of the wisdom of our ancestors upon questions of political economy. A very different view of the subject had taken place at the time of the trial respecting Arkwright's patent (1785), when the inconveni ence urged arose from the confining the benefit of an invention of such extensive consequence to a single individual. In the scire facias in that case, one of the objections alleged against the patent was, that it was prejudicial and inconvenient to the subjects in general, and issue was taken upon that allegation; but at the opening of the trial, Buller, Justice, interposed, intimating his opinion that it was a mere consequential issue and a question of law upon which the prosecutors could not be permitted to give any evidence; and that if it was necessary to attack the patent upon those general words of the Act of Parliament, it should be stated in what respect it was so, and then the fact would be put in issue; and after some discussion, it was agreed that the case should be tried on the other issues in which the patent was impeached on specific grounds. (2.) The general objects of this Act in suppressing monopolies having been fully accomplished, the only questions which now arise respecting it are upon the effects of patents granted under this proviso. The patents are granted in an established and uniform form, except so far as relates to stating the particular subject of the grant, and contain a proviso that if the patente |