Protection, a Boon to Consumers; An Address Delivered Before the National Association of Knit Goods Manufacturers, at the Second Annual Meeting in New-York City, May 1, 1867 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1867. Excerpt: ... should exist at all, is a wonder. No other has been subjected to such vicissitudes or such temporizing legislation. No other has had so formidable a competitor. It has had to contend against a combination of British capital, so#vastt so patient, and so far-seeing in its purpose of aggrandizement, that it could throw its products upon the markets of the world, for year after year, without any profit, and wait until full indemnity might be secured for present sacrifices by the monopoly of markets of other nations, whose industry had been broken down by cheap imports. Our iron manufacture has had, besides, to contend with a people who have wasted the raw material of their mines with a prodigality whose consequences the wiser men of England even now look upon with dismay; and also with fluctuations of prices in England, varying from below the cost of production to one hundred and fifty per cent upon the actual cost. The iron industry has been able to obtain a foothold in this country only through the brief respites which our legislation has afforded from this competition. That it owes its existence to the brief periods of prosperity due to protective legislation, is capable of demonstration. Its production was doubled during the protective period from 1828 to 1832, having reached in the latter year the quantity of 210,000 tons, although our population had increased only twenty per cent. For eight years later, under a free-trade policy, till 1842, although our numbers were increasing at the rate of thirty per cent, our production made no progress, having at the end of this period reached only 232,000 tons. Prom 1842 to 1848, under protection, with a growth of population of only 20 per cent, it trebled, having reached the amount of 800,000 tons in 1848. Abandon...