mselves in value. We can not
express the weight of the obligation which the country owes to this
invention. The extent of it can not now be seen."

Surely, the reader will exclaim, if such was the profit of this
invention to the country at large, what a vast fortune must it have
been to its inventor! Let us see. In May, 1793, Whitney and Miller went
to Connecticut and established a factory for the construction of cotton
gins. They were in possession of a patent which was supposed to pledge
to them the protection of the United States. The demand for the machine
was increasing every day, and it seemed that they would reap a golden
harvest from it. They were disappointed. The machine was so simple that
any competent mechanic could easily manufacture one after examining the
model, and this temptation to dishonesty proved too strong for the
morality of the cotton-growing community. In a short time there were
hundreds of fraudulent machines at work in the South, made and sold in
direct and open violation of Whitney's rights. In vain the inventor
brought suit against those who infringed his patent. It was rare that a
jury in a cotton State gave a verdict in his favor. In Georgia it was
boldly asserted that Whitney was not the inventor of the cotton gin, but
that some persons in Switzerland had invented something similar to it,
and the substitution of teeth, cut in an iron plate, instead of wire,
was claimed as superseding his invention. The Legislature of South
Carolina granted him the beggarly sum of $50,000 for the use of his
invention by the planters of that State; but it was only by going to
law, and after several tedious and vexatious suits, that he was able to
secure this sum. Tennessee agreed to allow him a percentage for the use
of each saw for a certain period, but afterward repudiated her contract.
The action of North Carolina forms the only bright page in this history
of fraud and wrong. That State allowed him a percentage for the use of
each saw for the term of five years, and promptly collected the money
and paid it over to the patentee. For fourteen years Whitney continued
to manufacture his machines, reaping absolutely no profit from his
investments, and earning merely a bare support. During all this time his
rights were systematically violated, suits were wrongfully decided
against him by various Southern courts, and he was harassed and
plundered on every side. America never presented a more shameful
spectacle