Note 1145 — Chapter VIII

Ogden protested against the Livingston-Fulton steamboat monopoly in a Memorial to the New York Legislature. (See Duer, 94-97.) A committee was appointed and reported the facts as Ogden stated them; but concluded that, since New York had granted exclusive steamboat privileges to Livingston, "the honor of the State requires that its faith should be preserved." However, said the committee, the Livingston-Fulton boats "are in substance the invention of John Fitch," to whom the original monopoly was granted, after the expiration of which "the right to use" steamboats "became common to all the citizens of the United States." Moreover, the statements upon which rested the Livingston monopoly of 1798 "were not true in fact," Fitch having forestalled the claims of the Livingston pretensions. (Ib. 103-04.)