In a Letter to an Early Congressional Supporter, Samuel F.B. Morse Moves to Fast Track His Telegraph Bill to Fund the First Ever Telegraph Line

“Some of the friends of my bill are intending to have it brought up today, if the House are disposed to go into Committee of the Whole on State of the Union. Shall I ask the favor of your attention to it?”

This is a very rare letter of Morse concerning obtaining the funding for his telegraph, being the first we’ve had

The idea of using electricity to communicate over distance is said to have occurred to Morse during a conversation aboard ship when he was returning from Europe in 1832. Michael Faraday’s recently invented electromagnet was much discussed by the ship’s passengers, and when Morse came to understand how it worked, he speculated that it might be possible to send a coded message over a wire. He set to work developing such an idea, and had some success; but he also encountered obstacles. Then Professor Leonard Gale showed Morse how he could regularly boost the strength of a signal and overcome the distance problems he had experienced by using a relay system Joseph Henry had invented. Morse’s system ultimately used an automatic sender consisting of a plate with long and short metal bars representing the Morse code equivalent of the alphabet and numbers. The operator slid a pointer connected to a battery and the sending wire across the bars, and immediately the appropriate dots and dashes were sent over the line. The receiver used an electromagnet with a stylus (a pen-like instrument) on the end of an arm. When the magnet operated, the stylus made an impression or tiny dent in a paper tape which wound past a clockwork motor. The tape was then read by the operator. By December 1837, Morse had enough confidence in his invention to apply to the federal government for an appropriation to run a telegraph line of 40 miles, and during the next year he conducted demonstrations of his telegraph both in New York and Washington. However, when the economic disaster known as the Panic of 1837 took hold of the nation and caused a long depression, Morse was forced to wait for better times.

By late 1842, the country was beginning to recover economically, and Morse again asked Congress for financial assistance. By now Morse had gained the attention of Maine Congressman Francis Ormand Jonathan Smith, who became a shareholder in his venture. In August of that year Morse wrote influential Congressman William W. Boardman, chairman of the powerful House Committee on Public Buildings and Grounds, asking that Congress appropriate funds for him, but no action was then taken. But in December 1842 Morse strung wires between two committee rooms in the Capitol and sent messages back and forth. Smith then authored a bill to appropriate $30,000 for a line between Washington and Baltimore. By then Boardman was an ally, as Morse wrote on December, 31, 1842: “Mr. Ferris, our representative, is very much interested in understanding the scientific principles on which my Telegraph is based, and has exerted himself very strongly in my behalf; so has Mr. Boardman…”

At the start of January 1843 it seemed that Morse’s telegraph bill had been fast tracked and was ready to be considered by Congress. Morse wrote on January 6, 1843, “I sent you a copy of the Report on the Telegraph a day or two since. I was in hopes of having it called up to-day, but the House refused to go into Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union, so it is deferred. The first time they go into Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union it will probably be called up and be decided upon. Everything looks favorable, but I do not suffer myself to be sanguine.” Morse then lobbied with his friends in Congress, including Boardman, to make that delay a very brief one.

Autograph letter signed, Monday morning, January 9, 1843, to “Hon. W.W. Boardman”, asking him to intervene to get the bill taken up promptly. “Some of the friends of my bill are intending to have it brought up today, if the House are disposed to go into Committee of the Whole on State of the Union. Shall I ask the favor of your attention to it? I am desirous of putting matters immediately in such a train that I may be prepared for the summer’s operations in case Congress should pass the bill, which I am encouraged to think they will. A few days delay now may make months of delay hereafter.”

The next days in the House were filled with debates and votes on an attempt to censure President Tyler, but friends of Morse’s bill remained alert. So just weeks later, in February, the telegraph bill was taken up. The House passed the bill on February 23, voting to appropriate $30,000 for an experimental telegraph line from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore, Maryland. On March 3 the Senate approved it in the final hours of that Congress’s last session. With President Tyler’s signature, Morse received the cash he needed and began to carry out plans for an underground telegraph line. This funding may be the first instance of government financial support to a private researcher. Construction of the telegraph line begins several months later. Once inaugurated in 1844, it was immediately clear that it changed the way people communicate forever.

This is a very rare letter of Morse concerning obtaining the funding for his telegraph, being the first we’ve ever had.