Colonial America mostly did not manufacture. England did it and Americans bought it.

This still occured after the American colonies got their freedom.

Hamilton wanted America to have a tariff wall to keep out many British products. That would cause people who wanted manufactured goods to have to buy them in the USA. That would cause the few small industries to grow and prosper and hire more people.

Jefferson did not want this. He did not want the South to become dependent on the North.

Why couldnt the South just make its own manufactured goods? It was too hot in the South for factories.

So from the beginning to the early 1800s that was how things stayed.

Then came the Napoleanic Wars and the British were interfering with American ships. Jefferson was president then (1801 to 1809). Jefferson would not get involved in a war. He thought that if he could stop trade between the US and England it would hurt England enough to back off American shipping.

Jefferson then declasred what he called an EMBARGO. But it was an American Embargo upon itself. Americans were no longer allowed to trade with England.

BUT Americans still wanted their manufactured goods. So the Northern manufacturers were suddenly given practically all the job orders England had had. Suddenly America's industries grew from few and tiny to many and large. IRONICALLY, THE MAN WHO WANTED FREE TRADE AND FOR AMERICA TO BE AN AGRARIAN SOCIETY AND NOT AN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY WAS THE VERY MAN WHO CREATED IT!!!!

Jefferson saw that the embargo did not stop England from bothering American ships and went to stop the embargo. But the northernors would not let it happen. They now had too much money invested in industry. So it was only partially dismantled.

From that moment on the tariffs put on foreign goods were the number one thing north and south argued about until WWII.

If you look in the Congrssional record or in the PROFESSIONAL bios of the presidents you will see TARIFFS come up more often than SLAVERY or anything else. It was an on-going argument.

Now that the South could buy manufactured goods from both or either New England or England they could play them against each other. The two sources had to compete. And how much they competed depended upon how high the tariff wall was. When balanced between the two the two had to compete with each other for the Souths money. So naturally, the north wanted the tariffs to be as HIGH as possible to keep out British competition while the South wanted it lower.

From 1808 until WWII the Tariff Wall, otherwise known as Protectionism was the constant battle in Congress.

But then came America's great victory in WWII. We were way ahead of the rest of the world. All the competing industrial nations were destroyed and bankrupt. We were untouched and had all the gold. And all the untouched industrial plants. An entire generation, for the first time, grew up knowing nothing about tariffs and how they had protected american industry.

I sure did not. I was born in the late 40s. All through the 1950s I never heard of TARIFF WALLS and never thought about anyone else ever competing with the USA. The first time I had heard of them was in 1969 when Johnny Carson suddenly started making jokes about The Tariff every night. Everyone laughed as it was then considered to be some silly old thing from the past when people had handlebar mustaches and rode pig irom bikes. The USA had been so very rich from 1945 until then, 1969, that the idea of Tariffs had disappeared. Little did we know that a catastrophe was right around the corner and when it happened noone would know why it did or how to dig out of it.

In 1970 I recall reading a Time Magazine article about how Germany and Japan were catching up to America but I wasnt afraid of it.

Then in Oct 1973 everything collapsed with the Oil Cutoff. Most American had no idea we got so much oil from the Arab States. All we ever heard of was Texas and never really cared. Everything went crazy and not one person said TIME TO BRING BACK THE TARIFF WALL!!!! as noone even thought of them anymore. By not using it our main industries were ruined over the rest of the 1970s when a return to the Protectionism of 1808 to WWII would have saved them. .... enough for now.