Authorizing Pilot Program for Patent Cases

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 628, and I want to begin by acknowledging the leadership of my colleague Darrell Issa from California in developing this bill. I joined with Mr. Issa to introduce this important legislation back in the 109th Congress. It has not been a short road to get here today to hopefully enact this bill, but we would not have made it without his leadership.

I partnered with Mr. Issa on the bill because we share a deep interest in improving the efficiency of the patent process, in reducing litigation costs and inefficiencies in patent review, and also in improving the quality of patents. This bill, in part, grew from a hearing in the 109th Congress on improving Federal court adjudication of patent cases in response to high rates of reversal. At this hearing, a number of proposed options to address this issue were discussed. Serious concerns were expressed about a number of proposals, including those that would create new specialized courts and those that would move all patent cases to existing specialized courts. These concerns centered around the need to maintain generalist judges, to preserve random case assignment, and to continue fostering the important legal percolation that currently occurs among the various district courts. Our proposal aims to avoid these pitfalls.

H.R. 628 establishes a mechanism to steer patent cases to judges that have the desire and the aptitude to hear such cases while preserving the principle of random assignment in order to prevent forum shopping among the pilot districts. The legislation will also provide the Congress and the courts with the opportunity to assess the program on a periodic basis. Reports will examine whether the program succeeds in developing greater expertise among participating district judges, the extent to which the program contributes to improving judicial efficiency in deciding these cases, and whether the program should be extended, expanded, or made permanent. By providing our courts with the resources they need to carefully consider patent cases, we will ultimately save the taxpayer money.

While this legislation is an important step at addressing needed patent reforms, I believe that Congress must continue to work on a more comprehensive reform of our patent system, and I look forward to continuing my work with my colleagues in order to address these issues.

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