In our April 1995 Newsletter (N.S. 185) we reported that the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the case of Markman v. Westview Instruments Inc. held that determining the meaning and scope of a patent claim is to be determined by a judge as the construction of a patent claim is a matter of law exclusively for the court. In a unanimous decision, the United States Supreme Court affirmed the Federal Circuit's decision and held that the construction of a patent including terms of art within its claim is exclusively within the province of the court.

The Court reviewed the history and precedent of patent cases including 18th and 19th century cases and found where history and precedent provide no clear answers, functional considerations play a part in choosing between judge and jury to define terms of art and the Court found judges better suited for the task. A patent was compared to a written instrument such as a contract and "the judge, from his training and discipline, is more likely to give a proper interpretation to such instruments than a jury; and he is, therefore, more likely to be right, in performing such a duty, than a juror can be expected to be."

The Court also cited the importance of uniformity in the interpretation of a patent as another reason to allocate issues of construction to the court. The Court considered that treating interpretative issues as purely legal will promote interjurisdictional certainty through the application of stare decisis on those questions not yet subject to jurisdictional uniformity under the authority of the single appeals court.