icious and the depraved to seize and
appropriate the inventor's rights. These robberies were upheld by those
who were anxious to share in the profits; and political demagogues made
themselves popular by misrepresenting Whitney, and clamoring against
the law that was intended to protect him. It was only by means of this
clamor, half political and wholly dishonest, that the plain rights
of Whitney could be denied and justice postponed. His invention was
entirely new. It was distinct from every other. It had no connection
with and no relation to any other invention that had been made. It stood
alone, and there could be no difficulty whatever in identifying it. And
yet Whitney had just this difficulty. In his efforts to prove that he
was the inventor of the cotton gin, and that he was entitled to a share
of the immense profits that those who used it were reaping, he had to
travel thousands of miles, and spend thousands of dollars in appearing
before Legislatures and in courts that denied him justice. The life
of his patent had nearly expired before any court finally enforced
his right, and Congress refused to grant him an extension beyond
the fourteen years that had then nearly expired. Associations and
combinations had been formed for the purpose of defrauding Whitney, and
these were represented by the ablest lawyers that could be hired. It is
no wonder that Whitney, in writing to Robert Fulton, a brother inventor,
declared that the troubles he had to contend with were the result of a
lack of desire on the part of mankind to see justice done. The truth is,
his invention was of such prime importance that the public fought for
its possession, and justice and honesty were for the moment lost sight
of. At one time but a few men in Georgia were bold enough to go into
court and testify to the simplest facts within their knowledge;
and Whitney himself says, that in one instance he had the greatest
difficulty in proving that the machine had been used in Georgia,
although at that very moment three, separate gins were at work within
fifty yards of the building in which the court sat. They were all so
near, that the rattle and hum of the machinery could be heard from the
court-house steps.

In December, 1807, a judge was found to affirm the rights of Whitney
under his patent. The judge's name was Johnson; and in his decision he
said, "The whole interior of the Southern States was languishing, and
its inhabitants emigrating for want o