Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 3.djvu/137

 court to close the free factory. The Association, through its attorneys and officers, met the syndicate at every point of attack in the courts and A. B. Cummins made a special study of the patent laws and decisions and was fully prepared to meet every new assault. The contest became one of national importance and was watched with absorbing interest by all who were interested in free factories and cheap fencing. While the legal battle was in progress attempts were made to bribe the officers of the Association, the superintendent of the free factory, the attorneys employed and the inventor of some of the machinery used in the free factory. These attempts were only partially successful. A large sum of money was used by the syndicate in this way with very unsatisfactory results. One of the patentees of machinery, employed by the Association, was bought out at a large price and one of the prominent attorneys was alienated from the Association but the free factory continued furnishing fence wire to its members at prices fifty per cent. less than those fixed by the syndicate. The chief attorney for the Association, A. B. Cummins, the President, M. L. Devin, and the Superintendent of the factory, W. L. Carpenter, were always true to the cause in which they were engaged and none of the alluring inducements held out to them by the Washburn combination could swerve them from their fidelity to the cause in which they had enlisted. For more than five years the contest continued. Intimidation, costly litigation and large amounts of money were the weapons used by the syndicate in the vain efforts to close, tie up or buy this free factory which was demoralizing the powerful combination and compelling it to reduce prices which the members were bound by a compact to maintain. A number of the most important suits brought by the syndicate were decided against its vital claims. The example of one free factory defying all efforts of the syndicate in the end broke the combination. Other factories were started independent of the syndicate, prices