The MPEP
Patent Law comes from the laws and rules established by the PTO, a division of the Department of Commerce.

All the in's and out's of these laws and rules are explicitly written out in the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP). The MPEP is right around 3,000 pages long and it references many of the official rules and laws established by the Patent and Trademark Office (PTO).

There are two sources for the laws and rules covered in the MPEP. The first are the laws described in "United States Code Title 35 - Patents". This group of laws is referred to as 35 U.S.C.

The second source includes the rules described in the "Code of Federal Regulations - Patents, Trademarks and Copyrights". These rules and regulations are referred to as 37 C.F.R. As far as patent law is concerned, you only need to be familiar with the rules and regulations covered in the Patent section of 37 C.F.R.

The MPEP includes all the relevant laws and rules you need to know to write and prosecute a patent. Within it, every angle of each law and rule is covered, in addition to the forms used to file a patent application. The writers of the MPEP have also made sure to fill it with important court case citations that have been used over the years to help establish patent law.

The Dynamics
As the laws, rules, and even the interpretations of the MPEP change, new revisions of the MPEP are published. You may expect a new revision to pop up about every 1 to 2 years.

It's important to realize that the MPEP, 35 U.S.C. and 37 C.F.R. are very dynamic and fluid. The Patent Office frequently makes changes to the rules, laws and even the MPEP itself in between new MPEP editions. You may track all the changes on the "Official Gazette - Recent Patent related changes" website at www.uspto.gov.

Interestingly, the early patent system did not bother with examining patent applications at all. An individual just sent in a patent application and it was automatically approved. Things are definitely very different now.