A couple of posts down, I cast some doubt on the assertion that continued British rule would have slowed American economic growth after 1776. I have now come across a Gavin Wright essay that makes just that case.
Wright argues, correctly I think, that a lot of early American growth was based on the creation of a labor market that excluded slavery from the Northwest (i.e., Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio), a relatively egalitarian land distribution, a unified national product market and deep capital markets. If those three things do not happen under continuing British imperial rule, then North America will be poorer.
On page 294, Wright suggests that the British parliament might have done less to exclude slavery from the Northwest. I am skeptical of that proposition. It is true that Indiana only rejected slavery because Congress would not have admitted it as a slave state under the written conventions on Senate balance. But it is also true that the imperial British parliament could have even more clearly and less contentiously banned slavery from the area. I do not see why London would be slower to act than Washington. After all, the Empire did ban slavery almost three decades before the United States.
Wright raises the issue of a more egalitarian land distribution but then drops it. It seems uncontestable that American policy fostered a more equal land distribution. (Certainly in what was then called the Northwest.) two propositions remain unclear: (1) how much those policies worked relative to an imperial counterfactual and; (2) how much they mattered to growth as opposed to distribution. Color me agnostic.
It is true that independence fostered the growth of American capital markets. But Canada developed solid capital markets and a strong banking system. It is possible that internal disunity under British rule would have delayed the creation of an American capital market, but I am skeptical. There certainly would have been less fear of default among British colonial provinces than American federal states.
What does that leave? Continued British rule might have led to interprovincial protectionism from each other combined with lower tariffs against Britain. Both outcomes are possible. Canadian history suggests otherwise, but only after a span of decades. For example, Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick only established reciprocal free trade in 1846. That on a continental scale would have made British North America poorer than our United States.
In short, had continued British rule fostered multiple small and protectionist provinces (as it did in Canada for a remarkably long time), then it would have been bad for North America.
But was that a likely outcome?
Wouldn't a British *North America (that is, the midatlantic colonies and New England) have delayed emancipation of slavery? The desire to free slaves in those regions was driven by the ideals of the Revolution, and quite a few abolitionists pointed out "hey, maybe we shouldn't treat people as property while we fight for freedom?"
Take the Massachussetts Supreme Court decision in 1783:
"But whatever sentiments have formerly prevailed in this particular or slid in upon us by the example of others, a different idea has taken place with the people of America, more favorable to the natural rights of mankind, and to that natural, innate desire of Liberty, with which Heaven (without regard to color, complexion, or shape of noses-features) has inspired all the human race. And upon this ground our Constitution of Government, by which the people of this Commonwealth have solemnly bound themselves, sets out with declaring that all men are born free and equal -- and that every subject is entitled to liberty, and to have it guarded by the laws, as well as life and property -- and in short is totally repugnant to the idea of being born slaves. This being the case, I think the idea of slavery is inconsistent with our own conduct and Constitution; and there can be no such thing as perpetual servitude of a rational creature, unless his liberty is forfeited by some criminal conduct or given up by personal consent or contract ..."
Okay, maybe the Massachussetts Supreme Court just relies on Somerset, the British decision that abolished slavery. But it seems suspect.
A lot depends on why Britain doesn't lose the colonies, I grant. If there's no revolution, but some sort of grand compromise, then the colonies also miss out on the costs of the Revolution and the decade of hardship that followed.
Posted by: Scott | October 22, 2014 at 12:55 PM
Hmm. You raise a good point. If the northern states allow slavery to continue for much longer, it is a godawful tragedy.
But would it have slowed economic growth for long, given that the southern cotton economy was pulling the slaves out of the north? (And that's begging the question of whether slavery was incompatible with rapid economic growth -- the horrifying evidence is that it wasn't.) I'm still not sure Wright is correct.
Your point about the post-revolutionary lost decade is spot-on. I wish I'd thought of it.
And as you say, there are a lot of ways that North America could have remained within the British Empire. How really matters; it doesn't make sense to talk about the costs of remaining in the empire when "remaining in the empire" covers so many different institutional possibilities.
Posted by: Noel Maurer | October 22, 2014 at 05:41 PM