The New York herald., 1876-07-03
Sewing Machine Privileges.

The whole question of the desirability of
allowing inventors or companies to enjoy
patent rights which are equivalent to mo-
the paving stone which Bridget Barry cast
through the glass window of the Weed Sew
ing Machine Company, and there is little
doubt that the public conscience will de-
mand the extinction of the unjust privileges
which have been too carelessly granted by
Congress. The sewing machine companies
resemble the boy in the fable who was not
content with q reasonable supply of nuts
from the jar, but, urged by avarice. would
have nothing less than handful. So the
sewing machine companies are likely to find
themselves compelled to relinquish the ad-
vantages they have hitherto enjoyed at the
expense of the most oppressed and most de-
serving class Of the community. Nothing
can better illustrate the meanness which at
tends modern money grubbing than that
huge corporations of men, making pre-
tence to honesty and responsibility,
should be banded together with the
object of expressing helpless girls and
women while pretending to play the role of
philanthropists. For, disguise as they may
their system of payment by instalment and
iniquitous contracts, which deliver the un-
fortunate sewing women, bound hand and
foot, into their power they cannot persuade
any honest thinking man that their pre-
tended kindness is anything but clever
scheme for profiting by the ignorance and
helplessness of the struggling poor who are
ever ready to catch at straws to save them
selves from social drowning. The system of
special protection to companies manufactur-
ing articles OF prime necessity to the people is
wholly indefensible, and it is just such in
cidents rs the injustice which armed Bridget
Barry's despairing hand against the Weed
Sewing Machine Comp ny's glass that COM
pels public attention to the wrongs and
expressions that the poor are suffering in
dumb misery. The sleek employees who are
the passive agents in this wrongdoing
are shocked that a police magistrate
should think justice higher than law but
public sentiment will always support those
who, like Judge Duffy, act in way to show
that in this free country the magistracy is an
agent of protection MS well as of punishment.
There can be no sounder or moro healthy
lesson taught to the suffering masses than
that embodied in Judge Duffys decision in
Bridget Barry's case namely, that where a
manifest outrage has been committed the law
will look to the provocation in judging acts
prompted by 1.-THE wild Justice of revenge"
And similar decisions will be sustained by
the conscience of the community, which
never hesitates to east its sympathies in
favor of justice and fair dealing. But the
radical cure is the best, and it lies in the
hands OF Congress to see that the sewing
machine be placed within reach of the poor
est workers by refusing any extension of
those patent rights which make the manu-
facture of these useful articles a monopoly,
and so enable rich corporations to pIundcr
poor scamstrcsses by selling their sewing
machines at exorbitant prices.
THE SYLVAN SHADES along the Hudson and
on Staten Island were thronged yesterday
by excursionists, who hurried from the
sweltering heat Of tho city to enjoy
he cool. refreshing breezes that