NECESSITY forced upon the first settlers of this country, at a very early period, some attention to manufactures. The colony of Massachusetts was founded in 1630. Between that year and 1640, there was a great and steady influx of settlers; and the first and most profitable object of pursuit was the raising of provisions. We can scarcely conceive of the state of industry in a community, to which there is every year added, by emigration, a number of individuals equal to the existing population. Such, however, for a few years, was the case in New England. So great was the demand, that cattle sold as high as twenty-five pounds sterling a head. In 1640, the republicans got possession of the government in England; persecution for religious non-conformity ceased, and with it the influx of emigrants to this country. Cattle fell immediately to about five pounds a head. The effect was distressing, but it put the sagacious colonists upon new resources. The account of this, contained in the early historian of the colony, is strongly characterized by the simplicity of elder times. After describing the check put to emigration, he goes on as follows:—‘Now the country of New England was to seek, of a way to provide themselves with clothing, which they could not obtain by selling cattle, as before; which now were fallen from that huge price forementioned, first to fourteen pounds sterling and ten pounds sterling a head, and presently after, at best within the year, to five pounds a-piece; nor was there at that rate, a ready vent for them neither. Thus the flood which brought in much wealth to many persons, the contrary ebb carried all away out of their reach. To help them in this their exigent, besides the industry that the present necessity put particular persons upon, for the necessary supply of themselves and their families, the general court made order for the manufacture of woolen and linen cloth, which, with God’s blessing upon man’s endeavor, in a little time stopped this gap in part, and soon after another door was opened by special Providence. For when one hand was shut by way of supply from England, another was opened by way of traffic, first to the West Indies and Wine islands, whereby among other goods, much cotton wool was brought into the country from the Indies, which the inhabitants learning to spin, and breeding of sheep and sowing of hemp and flax, they soon found out a way to supply themselves of [cotton] linen, and woolen cloth.’

In 1645, an iron foundery was established at Lynn, in the state of Massachusetts; but the same historian tells us that ‘instead of drawing out bars of iron for the country’s use, there was hammered out nothing but contentions and lawsuits.’ In the same year, the general court of the colony granted to a company, of which governor Winthrop’s son was the head, as an encouragement to undertake the iron manufacture, three thousand acres of land, a monopoly for twenty-one years, the liberty to use any place containing ore, in the public domain not already granted, a tract of land three miles square in the neighborhood of each establishment, and freedom from taxation. These liberal acts of encouragement show the necessity which was felt in the very infancy of the country, of giving a legislative protection to manufactures.

But to understand the history of the industry of the country, we must bear in mind, that America was a colonial possession, and that the growth and welfare of the mother country was the avowed object of colonial policy. Great Britain, if she wished America to prosper, wished it to be on the principles, not of national, but of colonial prosperity; to furnish her such agricultural products as she did not raise herself, to employ her shipping, and to consume her manufactures. As it soon appeared that the Dutch, at that time the most expert navigators in Europe, were getting possession of no small part of the carrying trade of the world, and pursuing a profitable commerce with a part of the colonial possessions of Great Britain, the navigation law of 1650 was passed, under the auspices of Cromwell. It was among the few laws of the commonwealth, which were re-enacted at the restoration. The object of this law,—in the opinion of Sir William Blackstone, ‘the most beneficial for the trade and commerce of these kingdoms,’—was, in the words of the same accomplished jurist, ‘to mortify our sugar islands, which were disaffected to the parliament, and still held out for CharlesII., by stopping the gainful trade, which they then carried on with the Dutch, and at the same time to clip the wings of these our opulent and aspiring neighbors.’ Although aimed particularly at the West Indies, this law, of course, extended its provisions to all the other British colonies, and among them to those established on the American coast. By them, however, it was generally resisted as an encroachment on their rights. Ineffectual attempts were made for a century, to enforce it; and in this struggle were sowed the seeds of the revolution.

Nor did the humble attempts of the colonies in manufactures fail to awaken the jealousy of the mother country. Sir Josiah Child, although a more liberal politician than many of his countrymen, in his discourse on trade, published in 1670, pronounces New England ‘the most prejudicial plantation of Great Britain;’ and gives for this opinion the singular reason, that they are a people ‘whose frugality, industry, and temperance, and the happiness of whose laws and institutions promise to them long life, and a wonderful increase of people, riches, and power.’

After many fruitless attempts, on the part of the executive authority of Great Britain, to keep down the enterprise and industry of the country, in those departments of industry which were disallowed by the laws of trade, recourse was had to parliament. The house of commons took up the subject in 1731, and called upon the board of trade and plantations to make a report ‘with respect to any laws made, manufactures set up, or trade carried on in the colonies, detrimental to the trade, navigation and manufactures of Great Britain.’ In the result of this inquiry it appeared, that among other branches of manufacture for domestic supply, hats were made in the colonies in considerable quantities, and had even been exported to foreign countries. In consequence of this alarming discovery, the law of 5 GeorgeII. c.22. was passed, forbidding hats or felts to be exported from the colonies, or even ‘to be loaded on a horse, cart, or other carriage for transportation, from one plantation to another.’ Nor was this all; in 1750, a law was passed by the parliament of Great Britain, which must be considered a disgrace to the legislation of a civilized country. It prohibited ‘the erection or continuance of any mill or other engine for slitting or rolling iron, or any plaiting forge, to work with a tilt hammer, or any furnace for making steel, in the colonies, under penalty of two hundred pounds.’ Every such mill, engine, forge, or furnace was declared a common nuisance, which the governors of the provinces, on information, were bound to abate, under penalty of five hundred pounds, within thirty days!

It has been, within a few years, stated by Mr.Huskisson, and with truth, that the real causes of the revolution are to be found, not in the irritating measures that followed Mr.Grenville’s plan of taxation, but in the long-cherished discontent of the colonies, at this system of legislative oppression. Accordingly, the first measures of the patriots aimed to establish their independence, on the basis of the productive industry and the laborious arts of the country. They began with a non-importation agreement, nearly two years before the declaration of independence. This agreement, with the exception of the addresses to the people of America and Great Britain, was the only positive act of the first Congress, that met at Philadelphia in 1774, and it is signed by every member of that body. The details, to which it descends, are full of instruction. The seventh article provides that ‘we will use our utmost endeavors to improve the breed of sheep, and increase their numbers to the greatest extent;’ and the eighth, ‘that we will, in our several stations, encourage frugality, economy, and industry, and promote agriculture, arts, and the manufactures of this country, especially those of wool.’

The policy indicated by these resolutions was, of course, favored by a state of war. All regular commercial intercourse with Great Britain was interrupted, and the supply of prize goods, which took its place, was casual and uncertain. We had as yet formed no connections in trade, with other countries; nor if we had, could their manufactures have found their way across the ocean, amidst the cruisers of the enemy, at any other than high prices. Fresh impulse was accordingly given to what few manufactures existed before the revolution, and new ones of various kinds were attempted with success. One of the earliest of these was the manufacture of nails, upon which lord Chatham had placed his memorable prohibition. It is within the memory of man, that the first attempt to manufacture cut nails, in New England, was made in the southern part of Massachusetts in the revolutionary war, with old iron hoops for the material, and a pair of shears for the machine. Since that period, besides supplying the consumption of the United States,—estimated at from eighty to one hundred million pounds, and at a price not much exceeding the duty,—machines of American invention for the manufacture of nails have been introduced into England; and large quantities of nails are exported from the United States to foreign countries.

On the return of peace in 1783, the influx of foreign goods, in many respects prejudicial to the country, proved in the highest degree disastrous to its mechanical and manufacturing industry. The want of one national government, and the division of the powers of government among thirteen sovereignties, made it impossible, by a uniform revenue system, to remedy the evil. The states generally attempted, by their separate navigation laws, to secure their trade to their own vessels; but the rivalry and selfish policy of some states counteracted the efforts of others, and eventually threw almost the whole navigation of the country into foreign hands. So low had it sunk in Boston, that in 1788, it was thought expedient, on grounds of patriotism, to get up a subscription to build three ships; and this incident, proving nothing but the poverty and depression of the town, was hailed as one which would give renewed activity to the industry of the trades’ people and mechanics of Boston! The same class of citizens and the manufacturers in general, in the state of Massachusetts, petitioned the government of that state, by bounties, imposts, and prohibitions, to protect their industry. This prayer was granted, and a tariff of duties laid, which in some points,—that of coarse cottons for instance,—was higher than any duty laid by Congress, before the war of 1812.

But the state of the country rendered these laws of little avail. Binding in Boston, they were of no validity in Rhode Island; and what was subject to duty in New York, might be imported free in Connecticut and New Jersey. The state of the industry of the country was depressed to a point of distress, unknown in the midnight of the revolution. The shipping had dwindled to nothing. The manufacturing establishments were kept up by bounties and by patriotic associations and subscriptions, and even the common trades were threatened with ruin. It was plain, for instance, that, in the comparative condition of the United States and Great Britain, not a hatter, a boot or shoe maker, a saddler, or a brass founder could carry on his business, except in the coarsest and most ordinary productions of their various trades, under the pressure of foreign competition. Thus was presented the extraordinary and calamitous spectacle of a successful revolution, wholly failing of its ultimate object. The people of America had gone to war, not for names, but for things. It was not merely to change a government administered by kings, princes, and ministers, for a government administered by presidents, and secretaries, and members of congress. It was to redress their own grievances, to improve their own condition, to throw off the burden which the colonial system laid on their industry. To attain these objects, they endured incredible hardships, and bore and suffered almost beyond the measure of humanity. And when their independence was attained, they found it was a piece of parchment. The arm which had struck for it in the field, was palsied in the workshop; the industry which had been burdened in the colonies, was crushed in the free states; and, at the close of the revolution, the mechanics and manufacturers of the country found themselves, in the bitterness of their hearts, independent—and ruined.

They looked round them in despair. They cast about for means of relief, and found none, but in a plan of a voluntary association throughout the continent, and an appeal to the patriotism of their fellow-citizens. Such an association was formed in Boston in 1787 or 1788, and a circular letter was addressed by them to their brethren throughout the union. The proposal was favorably received, and in some of the cities zealously acted upon; but, unsupported by a general legislation, its effects must at best have been partial and inadequate.

But before our citizens had discovered this, by sad experience, a new and unhoped-for remedy for their sufferings had been devised. The day-star of the constitution arose; and of all the classes of the people of America, to whose hearts it came as the harbinger of blessings long hoped for and long despaired of, most unquestionably the tradesmen, mechanics, and manufacturers hailed it with the warmest welcome. It had in fact grown out of the all-pervading inefficiency and wretchedness of the revenue system, which had been felt in ruin by them, more than by any other class. The feelings, with which it was regarded by the ‘tradesmen and manufacturers of New York,’ will appear from their letter, in reply to the circular of the association in Boston. This expression of the sentiments which were entertained in New York, while the adoption of the constitution by that state was an event of a few months’ standing, may afford instruction and bear repetition at the present day.

Such were the feelings and hopes, with which the laboring classes of the country in general, particularly the manufacturers and mechanics looked forward to the adoption of the federal constitution. In the state of Massachusetts, it is admitted, that the question of adoption was decided, under the influence of the association of tradesmen and manufacturers already mentioned. In the convention of that state, the encouragement of manufactures, by protecting laws, was declared in debate to be a leading and avowed object of the constitution. As it was successively adopted in each state, triumphant processions of the tradesmen, mechanics, and manufacturers, with the banners of their industry, and mottos expressive of their reliance on the new constitution for protection, evinced, in the most imposing form, and in the presence of uncounted multitudes, the principles, the expectations, and the hopes of the industrious classes of the community. Processions of this kind were organized in Portsmouth, in Boston, in New York, in Philadelphia, in Baltimore, and in Charleston; and the sentiment which animated and inspired them all, was that which was expressed in the motto inscribed upon the banners of the manufacturers in Philadelphia, ‘May the Union Government protect the Manufactures of America.’

Forty-three years have since passed, and it is now earnestly maintained, and that by intelligent citizens, that the federal constitution thus adopted, under the influence of the mechanics and manufacturers, (who knew that by the new government the power of protecting their pursuits was taken from the governments of the states, who had before held and exercised it), confers no power on congress to protect the labor of the country, and that the exercise of such power is unconstitutional. When we consider the control over public sentiment possessed by the associated mechanics and manufacturers of our large towns, and the slender majorities by which, in some states, the constitution was adopted it is not too much to say, that if such a conception of its powers had then prevailed, it never would have been ratified.

A quorum of the house of representatives under the new constitution was formed, for the first time, on 1st April, 1789. In one week from that day, Mr.Madison brought forward the subject of the revenue system, as the most important, which required the attention of the national legislature. Pending the discussion of this subject, and three days after it commenced, a memorial was presented ‘from the tradesmen, manufacturers, and others of the town of Baltimore, in the state of Maryland, praying an imposition of such duties on all foreign articles, which can be made in America, as will give a just and decided preference to the labors of the petitioners, and that there may be granted to them, in common with the other manufacturers and mechanics of the United States, such relief as to the wisdom of congress may seem proper.’ This was followed up, the next day, by a petition from the shipwrights of Charleston, S.C., stating ‘the distress they were in, from the decline of that branch of the business, and the present situation of the trade of the United States, and praying that the wisdom and policy of the national legislature may be directed to such measures, in a general regulation of trade, and the establishment of a proper navigation act, as will relieve the particular distresses of the petitioners, in common with those of their fellow shipwrights, throughout the union.’

Thus the two first memorials presented to the congress of the United States were for protecting duties on American industry; and of these memorials, one was from Baltimore, and the other from Charleston, South Carolina.

A few days after, a similar memorial came in from New York, ‘setting forth that, in the present deplorable state of commerce and manufactures, they look with confidence to the operations of the new government for a restoration of both, and that relief which they have so long and so ardently desired; that they have subjoined a list of such articles as can be manufactured in New York, and humbly pray the countenance and attention of the national legislature thereto.’

Numerous other petitions of like purport were shortly after presented, and in pursuance of their prayers, as well as from the crying demands of the public service, the first impost law was passed, at an early period of the session. It was, with the exception of the law prescribing the oaths of office, the first law, which was passed under the new government. In the long debate, which arose, at different stages of its progress, the idea was advanced, by members from every part of the country, that congress were bound to lay duties, that would encourage its manufacturing industry; and it does not appear that the suggestion was made in the reported debates, that they did not constitutionally possess the power. Mr.Madison thus expressed himself on the subject:—“The states, that are most advanced in population and ripe for manufactures, ought to have their particular interest attended to, in some degree. While these states retained the power of making regulations of trade, they had the power to protect and cherish such institutions. By adopting the present constitution, they have thrown the exercise of this power into other hands. They must have done this with the expectation, that those interests would not be neglected here.” And again, “duties laid on imported articles may have an effect, which comes within the idea of national prudence. It may happen that materials for manufactures may grow up, without any encouragement for this purpose. It has been the case in some of the states. But in others, regulations have been provided and have succeeded in producing some establishments, which ought not to be allowed to perish, from the alteration which has taken place. It would be cruel to neglect them, and turn their industry to other channels; for it is not possible for the hand of man to shift from one employment to another, without being injured by the change. There maybe some manufactures, which, being once formed, can advance toward perfection, without any adventitious aid; while others, for want of the fostering hand of government, will be unable to go on at all. Legislative attention will be therefore necessary to collect the proper objects for this purpose.” Such were the principles on which this law was supported; and when it finally passed, it was stated, in the preamble, to be ‘for the support of government, the discharge of the debts of the United States, and the encouragement and protection of manufactures.’

The present manufacturing system of the United States may be considered, partly as the result of the revenue laws of 1789, which remained without essential changes till the embargo of 1807, and partly as the effect of that and the other restrictive measures, and of the war which followed them. Those branches of industry, which are commonly called the mechanic arts, received, for the most part, though not without exception, an ample protection under the former laws:—manufactures on a large scale, requiring great capital and skill, owed their existence to the total interruption of commerce. In the combined result, a very large amount of American capital was, at the peace of 1815, found invested in manufactures. It was the prevalent opinion of the statesmen of that day, and those of the south among the foremost, that this capital ought to be protected; and the success which had attended some of the manufactures, on a large scale, had produced some change in the public opinion, as to the capacity of the country to support them.

In other parts of the volume we have mentioned the chief manufacturing establishments in the country, and, for the purpose of avoiding repetition, have reserved statistical details for the tabular views at the end of the work.