There were 9,788 applications for patents pending on the 1st day of
July, 1884, and 5,786 on the same date in the year 1885. There has been
considerable improvement made in the prompt determination of
applications and a consequent relief to expectant inventors.

A number of suggestions and recommendations are contained in the report
of the Commissioner of Patents which are well entitled to the
consideration of Congress.

In the Territory of Utah the law of the United States passed for the
suppression of polygamy has been energetically and faithfully executed
during the past year, with measurably good results. A number of
convictions have been secured for unlawful cohabitation, and in some
cases pleas of guilty have been entered and a slight punishment imposed,
upon a promise by the accused that they would not again offend against
the law, nor advise, counsel, aid, or abet in any way its violation by
others.

The Utah commissioners express the opinion, based upon such information
as they are able to obtain, that but few polygamous marriages have taken
place in the Territory during the last year. They further report that
while there can not be found upon the registration lists of voters the
name of a man actually guilty of polygamy, and while none of that class
are holding office, yet at the last election in the Territory all the
officers elected, except in one county, were men who, though not
actually living in the practice of polygamy, subscribe to the doctrine
of polygamous marriages as a divine revelation and a law unto all
higher and more binding upon the conscience than any human law, local
or national. Thus is the strange spectacle presented of a community