• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1560 0

had been before Congress many years without being acted upon. He explained to Morse that the main obstacle was the expense. Many members favored the cheaper plan of Gonon, who had just placed a working model of his semaphore atop the Capitol. There were other obstacles. The press of national business meant long delays in gathering quorums and getting bills reported out of committees to both houses of Congress, where they had to again await their place on a docket and then be debated. “A claim,” he told Morse, “therefore needs the most constant, unceasing and untiring and vigilant attention to see that it is not neglected.”

For a commission, Coffin offered to act as Morse’s agent in seeing the petition through. He said that he had the “warm friendship” of many congressmen, understood patent law, knew something about electromagnetism, and had much experience in forwarding bills. Sending along a testimonial from an influential House member, he promised to use “the most strenuous, untiring and energetic exertions to get Reports from the Committees in accordance with the prayer of the petition and to get the claim through both Houses of Congress.” If he failed, he asked no commission.

After two years of stagnation and hopelessness, Morse was enthusiastic about Coffin’s offer. “I at length have some nibbles at the Telegraph.” The other nibble arrived at about the same time. Some private individuals, “men of capital,” proposed financing a telegraph line of about 120 miles. Morse immediately consulted his partners, with whom he had fallen out of touch. Leonard Gale was in New Orleans, F. O. J. Smith back in Maine; Alfred Vail had married, become a father, and moved to Philadelphia. Morse asked Gale and Vail for a power of attorney so that he could act on their behalf. Recognizing Smith’s expertise in business, he asked him to come to New York: “I should prefer to have your business tact at hand to see that I did not defraud myself.”

Taking advantage of the nibbles proved not so easy. The capitalists’ proposal disappeared—“another of those ignes fatui,” Morse lamented, “that have just led me on to waste a little more time, money and patience and then vanished.” Coming to an agreement with his partners on Coffin’s offer meant three letters to write on each trivial point, then a week or ten days to receive an answer. Gale sent a power of attorney, but Vail wanted to consult his brother George. George had supplied most of the Vail money for Morse’s telegraph work so far, and like Alfred he resented Morse’s turn to photography. The Vails eventually granted a power of attorney, but negotiations about it hobbled on for four months.

Smith, an experienced Washington pol, was skeptical about Coffin’s assurance that he had enough influence to get the petition through Congress. Nevertheless he agreed to give Coffin a $2000 commission if he succeeded. But Coffin held out for $3000, “low enough,” he said, “especially as I have to take the risk after infinite labor of no remuneration.” He warned Morse that the Committee on Commerce had reported in favor of Gonon’s semaphore system: “Probably he and his friends will make great exertions to have it adopted, which once adopted, will be the death of yours.”

After months of this wearying back-and-forth, Morse felt futile, “almost ready to cast the whole matter to the winds, and turn my attention forever from the subject.” He thought of going to Washington himself to push his petition, but more than usually lacked funds. “I have scarcely (indeed I have not at all) the means to pay even the postage of letters on the subject.” The same want of money that kept him from acting, however, demanded that he act. Only his telegraph, he believed, could at last provide him a livelihood. And he had now become too deeply committed to its success to quit. “I have an invention which is to mark an era in human civilization, and is to contribute to the happiness of millions.”

Morse decided to start all over again. With the arrival of 1842 he launched a second, and more vigorous, campaign to get an appropriation