Failing to secure effective aid from his associates, Morse hung on grimly, fighting alone, and putting all of his strength and energy into the task of establishing an experimental line.  It was during these years that he demonstrated his greatness to the full.  His letters to the members of the Congressional Committee on Commerce show marked ability.  They outline the practical possibilities very clearly.  Morse realized not only the financial possibilities of his invention, but its benefit to humanity as well.  He also presented very practical estimates of the cost of establishing the line under consideration.  The committee again recommended that $30,000 be appropriated for the construction of a Washington-Baltimore line.  The politicians had come to look upon Morse as a crank, and it was extremely difficult for his adherents to secure favorable action in the House.  Many a Congressman compared Morse and his experiments to mesmerism and similar “isms,” and insisted that if the Government gave funds for this experiment it would be called upon to supply funds for senseless trials of weird schemes.  The bill finally passed the House by the narrow margin of six votes, the vote being taken orally because so many Congressmen feared to go on record as favoring an appropriation for such a purpose.

The bill had still to pass the Senate, and here there seemed little hope.  Morse, who had come to Washington to press his plan, anxiously waited in the galleries.  The bill came up for consideration late one evening just before the adjournment.  A Senator who noticed Morse went up to him and said: 

“There is no use in your staying here.  The Senate is not in sympathy with your project.  I advise you to give it up, return home, and think no more about it.”

The inventor went back to his room, with how heavy a heart we may well imagine.  He paid his board bill, and found himself with but thirty-seven cents in the world.  After many moments of earnest prayer he retired.

Early next morning there came to him Miss Annie Ellsworth, daughter of his friend the Commissioner of Patents, and said, “Professor, I have come to congratulate you.”

“Congratulate me!” replied Morse.  “On what?”

“Why,” she exclaimed, “on the passage of your bill by the Senate!”

The bill had been passed without debate in the closing moments of the session.  As Morse afterward stated, this was the turning-point in the history of the telegraph.  His resources were reduced to the minimum, and there was little likelihood that he would have again been able to bring the matter to the attention of Congress.

So pleased was Morse over the news of the appropriation, and so grateful to Miss Ellsworth for her interest in bringing him the good news, that he promised her that she should send the first message when the line was complete.  With the Government appropriation at his disposal, Morse immediately set to work upon the Washington-Baltimore line.  Professors Gale and Fisher served as his assistants, and Mr. Vail was in direct charge of the construction work.  Another person active in the enterprise was Ezra Cornell, who was later to found Cornell University.  Cornell had invented a machine for laying wires underground in a pipe.