Aspire BusinessGuide 2023 Digital - Flipbook - Page 8
HOW CHAMBERS OF
COMMERCE HELPED BUILD
THE AMERICAN ECONOMY
Chambers of commerce are perhaps some of the
most in昀氀uential institutions in the history of economic
development in America. From Medieval Merchant Guilds
to colonial privateer 昀氀eets and free trade associations,
chambers of commerce have a history that mirrors the
formation of the modern market economy and that embodies
the cultural views of the various local business communities
they represented.
Although chambers of commerce were historically extensions
of the economic interests of colonial European governments,
the American colonies would be where these institutions’
roles changed into independent engines of free enterprise.
The New York Chamber formed in 1768 and was the 昀椀rst
organization of its kind in North America.
These bastions of anti-tax and free trade advocates would
become signi昀椀cant players in the American Independence
movement. However, when a war looked like it was on the
horizon, many chambers saw this as bad for business.
“During the American Revolution, about two-thirds were
loyalists (against independence) and one-third were
patriots (for independence),” said Chris Mead, author of
The Magicians of Main Street: America and its Chambers
of Commerce, 1768-1945. “Among that one-third was John
Cruger, 昀椀rst president of the New York Chamber.”
With the newly independent nation building up its economy,
business and commercial interests reached the question of
whether to focus on trans-Atlantic trade or protect America’s
infant industry.
“During the early part of the industrial revolution in the
1830s, there was a debate in the Philadelphia Chamber
of Commerce about which direction we wanted to go as
a country,” said Mead. “In the direction of free trade and
an overseas focus or of limited and protected trade with a
domestic focus.”
Mead added that the members of the Philadelphia Chamber
who advocated for the domestic focus and protected trade
split from the group and formed the Board of Trade to
distinguish itself from the Chamber.
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ASPIRE JOHNSON COUNTY, IN | 2023-24 BUSINESS GUIDE
Chambers of commerce organizations across the country
were once again divided along regional and ideological lines
when the Civil War broke out. Mead noted that chambers
usually fell under whatever was the dominant sentiment of
their geographic location with many chambers in the South
supporting secession, and many in the North supporting
Lincoln’s Union cause.
Chambers of commerce were quick to prioritize economic
development once again during the Reconstruction period.
The focus on re-establishing commerce also allowed for
healing to take place between North and South and the
rebuilding of disbanded chambers of commerce.
“After the war, one of the 昀椀rst resolutions of the recently
re-established Charleston Chamber was about building a
railroad between Cincinnati and Charleston,” said Mead.
“What is the 昀椀rst thought that comes to chambers of
commerce after the war? Trade.”
At the turn of the Century, many business
interests across the nation converged and a
new uni昀椀ed national direction for the U.S.
economy was sought.
“The New York Chamber of Commerce had been attempting,
in a somewhat convoluted way, to act as a national chamber
of commerce would,” wrote Mead in The Magicians of
Main Street. “Not surprisingly, once the U.S. Chamber was
organized in 1912, the league was dissolved into it. The U.S.
Chamber could 昀椀nish the work of promoting nationwide
support for what would be a nationwide banking system (the
Federal Reserve).”
In the Great Depression, chambers of commerce were largely
strongholds against many of the Roosevelt Administration’s
government-heavy economic policies. However, by the
Second World War, much of the commercial interests of the
country shifted into military projects.
Indiana’s reputation for its strong pro-business environment
has much to do with the history of its own chamber
organizations. The earliest chamber organization in Indiana,
according to Mead’s book, appears to have been established
in New Albany around 1857.
