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America is a leader in developing todays new technologies because the nations founders provided for the protection of intellectual property.
The Constitution empowered Congress "to promote the progress of science and useful arts" by securing the rights of authors and inventors. In 1790, the first Congress voted to establish a system of patents to protect inventions, and President George Washington signed it into law barely a year after taking office.
During the century that followed, U.S. patents were issued for Morse code, Bells telephone, Edisons phonograph and many other momentous inventions that spurred economic growth and transformed everyday life. By enabling inventors to profit from their creativity, patents became a powerful engine for progress.
"A country without a patent office," Mark Twain wrote, is "just a crab, and couldnt travel any way but sideways or backways."
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