From the announcement of courses for the 1902-03 year, it would appear that the economics department reckoned with Frank Taussig’s return after a one year medical leave since he was listed to teach several courses, including U.S. economic history. However his leave needed to be extended and Oliver Mitchell Wentworth Sprague had to teach the course alone. This post provides the course description, enrollment figures and the final exam questions from 1902-03 for Economics 6.
Materials for the U.S. economic history course (Economics 6) taught at Harvard during the academic year 1901-02 have been posted earlier. They include a reading list for reports to prepared by the students. It was jointly taught by Oliver M.W. Sprague and James Horace Patten.
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Economics 6
Course Description
1902-1903
- The Economic History of the United States. Tu., Th., at 2.30. Professor Taussig and Dr. Sprague.
Course 6 gives a general survey of the economic history of the United States from the close of the eighteenth century to the present time, and aims to show on the one hand the mode in which economic principles are illustrated by American experience and, on the other, the extent to which economic conditions have influenced social and political development. The following are among the subjects considered: aspects of the Revolution and commercial relations during the Confederation and the European wars; the history of the protective tariff policy and the growth of manufacturing industries; the settlement of the West and the history of transportation, including the early canal and turnpike enterprises of the states, the various phases of railway building and the establishment of public regulation of railways; various aspects of agrarian history, such as the public land policy, the growth of foreign demand for American produce and the subsequent competition of other sources of supply, certain social topics, such as slavery and its economic basis, emancipation and the present condition of the Negro, the effects of immigration. Finally, the more important features of our currency and financial history are reviewed. Comparisons will be made from time to time with the contemporary economic history of Europe.
The course is taken advantageously with or after History 13. It is open to students who have taken Economics 1, and also to Juniors and Seniors who are taking that course.
Source: Harvard University. Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Division of History and Political Science[Comprising the Departments of History and Government and Economics], 1902-03. Published in The University Publications, New Series, no. 55. June 14, 1902.
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Economics 6
Enrollment
1902-1903
Economics 6. Dr. Sprague. — The Economic History of the United States.
Total 120: 1 Gr., 36 Se., 59 Ju., 15 So., 9 Others.
Source: Harvard University. Annual Report of the President of Harvard College, 1902-03, p. 68.
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Economics 6
Mid-Year Examination
1902-1903
- Was the colonial relationship economically advantageous to New England?
- The sale of public lands to 1821.
- The effect of the credit system in the South upon cotton growing.
- The investment of foreign capital and internal improvements in the United States.
- Contrast the views of Webster and Clay upon conditions in 1824, and give reasons for their difference of opinion.
- The United States “can without difficulty obtain from abroad the manufactured supplies of which they are in want, but they experience numerous impediments to the emission and vent of their own commodities. . . . A constant and increasing necessity on their part for the commodities of Europe, and only a partial or occasional demand for their own in return, could not but expose them to a state of impoverishment compared with the opulence to which their political and natural advantages authorize them to aspire.”
— Hamilton.
What would Gallatin have said of this argument for protection? What is your own opinion? - Why did not the opening of the Erie Canal at first greatly change the course of Western trade?
- Explain and illustrate the highly speculative character of American economic development.
Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year Examinations 1852-1943. Box 6. Papers (in the bound volume Examination Papers Mid-years 1902-1903).
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Economics 6
Year-End Examination
1902-1903
- The tariff act of 1883.
- “There are, however, some aspects of the tariff question on which the inductive and historical mode of inquiry has been more helpful. The protective policy of the United States has had unexpected successes and surprising failures.” Illustrate.
- Factors tending to the localization of industries.
- Why was the United States a more attractive country to immigrants in 1850 than in 1820?
- The future delivery system in the sale of cotton.
- What conclusions may be drawn from our experience under the tariffs of 1846 and 1857?
- Duties upon raw wool and their consequences.
Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1873-1915. Box 6. Papers Set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics, History of Religions, Philosophy, Education, Fine Arts, Architecture, Landscape Architecture, Music in Harvard College, June 1903 (in the bound volume Examination Papers 1902-1903).
Image Source: Oliver Mitchell Wentworth Sprague portrait in the Harvard Class Album 1915. Colorized by Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.