Science and Art in the Constitution

I'm rereading Professor Goldstein's fascinating book Copyright's Highway: From Gutenberg to the Celestial Jukebox.  In the chapter on the history behind the passage of the earliest laws protecting copyright, there is an interesting tidbit regarding the definition of certain key words in the Copyright and Patent Clause (Article I, Section 8), which says, "The Congress shall have Power . . . to promote the Progress of Science and the useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."  This is obviously the clause that gives Congress the right to pass the Copyright Act and the Patent Act.  It turns out that, at the time, "Science" was the subject matter of copyright and "useful Arts" was covered by patents.  I guess everything was all topsy-turvy back then, what with Federalists being in favor of a strong federal government and Democrats being frothy-mouthed states-rights literalists.

The original Copyright Act (1790) gave a fourteen-year copyright not only to books but also to maps and charts.  We have certainly come a long way since then.