Senators Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) are members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The committee is scheduled to consider amendments to long-debated patent reform proposals tomorrow.

Last month, members of Congress from across the political spectrum found common ground on a piece of legislation to ensure that our patent system benefits true innovators rather than those who abuse it.

Just a year after it first convened in April of 1790, the United States Congress passed legislation to promote the progress of science and the useful arts, giving American inventors the rights to the products they created. The bill would be the first of many to help foster an environment that both encouraged and protected our young nation’s innovators.

Unfortunately, 225 years later, the patent landscape for today’s tinkerers, small retailers, and tech innovators alike is a hostile one. For years, abusive actors have been taking advantage of a system meant to drive innovation, and have instead stifled job creation and threatened businesses around the country.

These bad actors—sometimes no more than a shell company with an army of lawyers—prey on our best and brightest innovators with the threat of costly litigation. Some scholars estimate that this takes billions of dollars out of the US economy every year. Patent litigation and litigation threats target an increasingly wide range of economic actors, from Main Street storefronts to tech startups.

The dilemma faced by anyone caught in the crosshairs is unbearable: spend precious time and resources defending against what are often overly broad or bogus infringement claims, or pay a handsome sum to make the lawsuit go away. The constant threat has discouraged entrepreneurs who are understandably hesitant to invest in innovation. In fact, the more companies invest in research and development, the more likely they are to be sued for patent infringement.

In recent years, the problem has only escalated. Earlier this month, the New York Times Editorial Board noted that from 2012 and 2013, the number of patent-infringement cases had increased by as much as 25 percent. And according to one study, there were six times more patent-related lawsuits in 2013 than in the 1980s.

Of course, this issue is not new to Congress. In fact, reforming the patent system in this country has been discussed throughout our tenure in the US Senate. But despite the need for serious reform, progress has been slow. Previous efforts left threats of abuse largely unaddressed, and although lawmakers in both the House and Senate began working on legislation last Congress, a resolution could not be reached.

Building on that progress and months of substantive discussions and input from a wide variety of stakeholders, along with several of our colleagues, we have introduced the bipartisan PATENT Act to clamp down on abusive patent assertion and restore the integrity of our intellectual property system.

The PATENT Act provides consensus solutions that would usher in significant reform and ease the burden on countless American companies and inventors. Our bipartisan bill shifts the legal burden back onto those who seek to game the patent system at the expense of businesses that are playing by the rules. The PATENT Act would put the responsibility on the plaintiff to explain the substance of the claim when filing an initial suit. It would also curb the practice of sending abusive demand letters that con people into paying settlement fees for unsubstantiated infringements. And it would limit costly discovery while preliminary matters in a case are resolved. Finally, our legislation would bring flexibility and transparency to patent litigation proceedings, discouraging frivolous lawsuits by shifting the responsibility for the cost of litigation to the losing party if the case was not objectively reasonable.

Real patent reform enjoys strong bipartisan support in Congress and is something the President has said he wants to accomplish. We firmly believe the PATENT Act’s sensible reforms are the best way to deter those who abuse the system while also protecting access to justice for patent holders with legitimate claims of infringement. It’s time for Congress to unite around a bill that protects American entrepreneurs and safeguards our country’s culture of innovation.