Cotton Gin Petition

Written by Eli Whitney on June 20, 1793

Reprinted in The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 26: 11 May to 31 August 1793, 1995

Eli Whitney (1765–1825) was one of the great inventors of the early Industrial Revolution in the United States. Whitney perfected the cotton gin, a machine that separates the seeds from the fibers of cotton. Although his cotton gin transformed the Southern economy and changed history, Whitney experienced little financial gain due to problems in the patent system of the new nation. A patent is a legal document issued by a government granting exclusive authority to an inventor for making, using, and selling an invention.

Whitney showed a strong interest in mechanical work from his early boyhood in Westboro, Massachusetts. Although he worked on his father's farm, he preferred his father's shop, where by the age of fifteen he labored part-time making nails for sale. As...