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TEXTILE AND OTHER INDUSTRIES.

other, had suffered from England's adverse legislation. The result was to compel the people to give their attention to home weaving and spinning. Fulling-mills were erected, first in Massachusetts and afterward in other colonies, and later woolen manufactories were set up. Early in the Eighteenth century spinning schools were established in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York, and some of these were continued down to the beginning of the Revolution. The Navigation Acts, the Sugar Act of 1764, and the Stamp Act of 1765 led to combined efforts on the part of merchants, manufacturers and the people to encourage home manufacturing and trade. In New York in 1764 a Society for the Promotion of Arts, Agriculture and Economy was organized, and premiums were offered for production of raw materials, linen thread and cloth, leather-shoes, woven stockings, hemp, flax, machinery, and stocking looms. This society and others of like nature continued work for several years, and with good results. England learned, early in 1765, that no less than fourteen new manufactories had lately been established in the colonies, to the loss of Great Britain of nearly half a million sterling. Special efforts were made to stimulate the making of cloths during the Revolution, especially the woolen industry. Before the adoption of the Constitution, manufactories of considerable size were working in several

VOL. IV-4

43

colonies. Machinery for making cotton and woolen cloth was coming into

use, and the great factory system which which was to make such radical change in labor condition in the next century was foreshadowed. In 1787 the first cotton-mill was built in Massachusetts. The Arkwright system of spinning was introduced in Rhode Island in the same year. Waterpower saw-mills, grist-mills, fullingmills and paper-mills were still the industrial dependence of the people, but the improvements of Oliver Evans in 1783, and his double-acting high-pressure engine a few years later, gave promise of change. Rumsey in 1785 on the Potomac, and Fitch in 1788 on the Delaware, began steam navigation.

Aside from agriculture, shipbuilding, iron mining and manufacturing, lumbering and the making of woolen and other cloths, the industries of the country at the close of the colonial period were not numerous, extensive, or financially important. For the most part, they were those called for to meet the domestic needs of the people. Saw-mills and grist-mills were everywhere. Bricks had been made in Virginia from 1612 and in Massachusetts from 1629; this industry was well carried on at the time of the Revolution and the production was in slight excess of the home consumption, small quantities being exported. Glass-making, although attempted by the first settlers, was not extensively continued, and no great

44

INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS AFTER THE REVOLUTION.

success was achieved in it before the Revolution. In 1787 in Albany, New York, in 1787 in Boston, in 1788 in Virginia, and in 1785 in Pennsylvania, glass-works were built and successfully carried on. Brewing in New York and Pennsylvania, winemaking in the South, salt manufacturing, the making of leather goods and other industries, mainly to meet local demands, had also attained to moderate proportions.

Even after independence had been secured, the people of the United States still had industrial England to contend with. Although, following the peace of 1783, there had been a gratifying increase in the bulk of manufactures of the country, the flood of foreign merchandise which began to flow in threatened to engulf the home industries. This was particularly true of iron manufactures and textiles. Numerous acts

were passed by the Parliament of Great Britain to prevent the introduction of English machinery and of English workmen into the United States, and otherwise to harass American industry and trade, while protecting its own insular interests. The trade independence of each of the thirteen States was also one of the contributing causes of this injurious competition with foreign imports, which reached proportions out of all comparison with the needs of the country.

With the ratification of the Constitution by the last of the thirteen

States, the general government was vested with power to regulate the trade of the country in such a way as should provide protection to all branches of industry. This achievement gave satisfaction to manufacturers and mechanics, who saw in it encouraging prospects for the future. The failure of Pitt's bill of 1783 for free trade between the United States and the British colonies, and also the failure to secure commercial treaties with France, Holland, Spain, and Portugal, made Congressional action for the protection and the encouragement of home industries an imperative necessity. The situation was met by the passage of the tariff bill of July, 1789, a measure which proved to be an effectual barrier to the tide of foreign imports and a stimulus to home industry, agricultural, commercial, and manufacturing. This marked the beginning of a new era in the industrial history of the republic.*

* J. Leander Bishop, A History of American Manufactures, vol. i. (3 vols., Philadelphia, 1868); The South in the Building of the Nation, vol. v., Economic History (12 vols., Richmond, 1909); W. B. Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, 1620-1789 (2 vols., Boston, 1899); J. M. Swank, History of the Manufacture of Iron in All Ages (Philadelphia, 1892); P. A. Bruce, Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century (2 vols., New York, 1896); G. S. Callender (ed.), Selections from The Economic History of the United States, 1765-1860 (Boston and New York, 1909); A. S. Bolles, Industrial History of the United States (Norwich, 1889); Carroll D. Wright, The Industrial Evolution of the United States (New York, 1895); Katharine Coman, Industrial History of the United States

DIVERSITY OF CROPS IN NORTH AND SOUTH.

Agriculture.

During the decade immediately preceding the Revolution, agriculture made some progress both in New England and in the Middle colonies, although this progress was in no wise comparable with the advance in the South. In New England a growing population found most profit in fisheries, shipbuilding, lumbering, manufacturing, and other non-agricultural pursuits. Consequently, most of what was raised in that section went to meet the demands of home consumption, although there were some exports of food stuffs, particularly to the West Indies. New York and Pennsylvania raised more for export than did the States of New England. Export figures for this decade make clear this relative agricultural condition of these two sections of the country—a condition that not only persisted throughout the century, but strengthened as time went on. By the end of the century New England had almost entirely withdrawn from agriculture, save for home needs, while the Middle States were beginning to feel the first industrial impulse toward dairying and mining, which were destined to develop into commanding proportions in the next century.

Meantime, the South continued on its way with its cultivation of plantation crops, although even there agri

(New York, 1905); J. B. McMaster, A History of the People of the United States (7 vols., New York, 1884-1910).

45

culture in its broadest sense was rudimentary in methods. In Georgia, as late as 1790," agriculture as we know it can scarcely be said to have existed. The plough was little used. The hoe was the implement of husbandry."* Virginia and the Carolinas, though ahead of Georgia in this respect, were not far advanced, save in the production of their principal staples, tobacco and indigo.

Tobacco continued to be the leading product of the South throughout the colonial period, especially in Virginia, where it was the main source of industrial prosperity. In 1765 the crop amounted to 75,482,000 pounds and nine years later it was 101,282,617 pounds. 617 pounds. There was a falling off during the years of the Revolution, but the high water mark in size of crops was reached toward the end of the century. In 1790 the crop, in round numbers, was 130,000,000 pounds, but the price had fallen to 3.40 cents per pound. Over one-half of the total Southern population was then either engaged in or depended upon the cultivation of tobacco. About this time improved methods of curing tobacco were introduced, particularly by the application of artificial heat.†

Although cotton was planted in the South early in the colonial era, it did not become a commercial rival of tobacco until after the opening of the Nineteenth century. The adaptability

* McMaster, United States, vol. ii., p. 4. The South in the Building of the Nation, vol.

v., p. 163.

46'

COTTON, SUGAR, RICE AND OTHER CROPS.

of Southern soil and climate to the raising of this staple was well known, but as yet there was no world market for it. Grown in the Carolinas in 1664, in Georgia in 1735, in Florida in 1754, and in Louisiana in 1722, it was utilized only in making the coarsest cloth for domestic weaving. During the Revolution, renewed efforts were put forth to cultivate and manufacture it, for the reason that trade with England being cut off, there was a dearth of clothing. Washington, Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, and other public men of the day expressed themselves hopefully that cotton might yet become a valuable staple; but, while the certainty of being able to raise it in large quantity was generally recognized, no market for it had as yet appeared. In 1786 the sea-island cotton was introduced into South Carolina from Barbadoes, and a considerable impulse was given to efforts to enlarge cultivation.

Sugar, which was destined to become one of the great staples of the South, was not known there until the middle of the Eighteenth century. Cane was brought into Louisiana and planted in 1751; in 1759, 1761, and 1765 attempts were made to manufacture sugar, but without success, only small quantities being produced for home consumption.

Introduced into South Carolina in the last decade of the Seventeenth century, rice soon became the staple commodity of that colony, attaining to the dignity of an export as early

as 1707. Improvement in its culture
went on steadily. In 1754 Charleston,
S. C., exported 104,680 barrels. Up-
land rice was first cultivated in 1772,
and culture by water was introduced
in 1784. It was successfully culti-
vated in Louisiana as early as 1718.
Although at first confined to South
Carolina, its culture slowly spread to
adjacent States and before the close
of the century it was raised to some
extent in North Carolina, Georgia,
Florida and Louisiana.
The low,

rich lands of South Carolina were
particularly favorable to the growth
of this plant and thus gave to that
State a preeminence in this branch of
agriculture that was never lost.

Hemp and flax culture began in the South in the latter part of this century, the gradual settling of western Virginia, western Carolina, and Kentucky bringing this about, as the people of those sections needed a clothing substitute for the cotton of the seaboard colonies. The first hemp crop on record was grown in Kentucky in 1775 and thence its culture spread to Tennessee, Arkansas and Missouri. "It was largely the hemp interest which decided that Missouri was to be a slave state and which nearly brought Kansas into the same category. It was the hemp interests of Kentucky which sent Henry Clay to Congress, and forced the establishment of the protective system in the United States."*

*The South in the Building of the Nation, vol. v., p. 232. See also W. B. Weeden, Economic and

INTRODUCTION OF LABOR-SAVING MACHINERY.

Labor.

Just prior to the Revolution came the invention of spinning machines in England by Arkwright, Hargreaves and others, and later, in 1785, the Cartwright power loom. Desperately determined to retain the manufacturing supremacy of the world which then belonged to it, England instituted strenuous measures to prevent America from acquiring any knowledge of these labor-saving devices. As early as 1774 stringent laws were passed prohibiting the exportation of any tools or utensils used in the manufacture of cotton or linen or of any such goods manufactured. This law was reënacted and enlarged in 1781 and again in 1782, so as to cover cotton, woolen, linen, silk, calico and muslin, and also iron and steel manufactures. The emigration of artisans versed in this work was made illegal.

But these efforts of the mother

Social History of New England (2 vols., Boston, 1894); L. H. Bailey (ed.), A Cyclopedia of American Agriculture, vol. iv. (4 vols., New York, 1909); Moses Jacobstein, The Tobacco Industry in the United States (New York, 1907); Ulrich B. Phillips (ed.), Documentary History of American

47

country to prevent her colonies from deriving any advantage from these new inventions proved altogether futile. In the fulling and carding-mills which were numerous in all parts of the country was the foundation for the new factory system. The South could be depended upon to supply the necessary raw material in the shape of cotton. Only the machinery of England was lacking, and American ingenuity set for itself the task of securing that. As an ultimate result of efforts in the direction of the invention and improvement of mill machinery, the factory system of labor was established in this country within a quarter of a century after it had been instituted in England. Prior to this time labor throughout the colonies, free, servitude or slave, had been individual and hand work, whether in agriculture, mining, fisheries or manufacturing. To a considerable extent, it was a household or family institution. Much of it was done in the workers' homes or on the farms, plantations, at shipyards or mines of proprietors who were small employers. With the introduction of

Industrial Society, vols. i. and ii., Plantation and machinery, began the system of collec

Frontier (Cleveland, 1910); American Husbandry (2 vols., London, 1775); F. J. Chastellux, Travels in North America (2 vols., London, 1787); M. B. Hammond, The Cotton Industry, in Publications of the American Economic Association (New York, 1897); P. A. Bruce, Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century (2 vols., New York, 1896); J. C. Ballagh (ed.), Economic History, 1607-1865, vol. v., in The South in the Building of the Nation (12 vols., Richmond, 1909); Charles L. Flint, One Hundred Years of Progress (Report of the United States Department of Agriculture, Washington, 1872).

tive labor as an adjunct to machinery, a system which very soon completely reversed labor conditions and labor results as they had before existed.

Philadelphia was the first place in America to procure a spinning-jenny from England. This was early in 1775, but it was not until after the war had ended that efforts were made

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