two millions and a half sterling." To emphasize his anguish, the writer put the "Two Millions And A Half" in capital letters. Colonial farmers also drew his wrath for, he declared, "American corn cannot come to an European market without doing mischief to the corn trade of England."
Trivial as it now seems in relative terms, colonial manufacturing set English capitalists by the ears. For example, in 1751, English ironmasters, proprietors of forests that supplied wood for smelting, and tanners who needed cheap bark for their leather industry, all united in protesting against American competition and induced a committee of Parliament to heed their objections. To make a tedious economic story short, in every sphere of economy, American business enterprise aroused the antagonism of rival interests in England and the latter in turn brought to bear on the government at London continuous pressure for legislation and administrative acts favorable to British merchants, shippers, and manufacturers.
Even the lucrative trade in finished commodities which English capitalists managed to hold in spite of the efforts of the colonies to supply themselves had within it the seeds of irritation. For goods bought in English markets, the colonists had no large supply of precious metals with which to pay; they were always heavily in debt for commodities purchased and capital borrowed. Efforts to secure specie, bills of exchange, and acceptable materials by means of which to discharge their obligations in London kept them at their wits' ends.
The people of Rhode Island, by way of illustration, had to find more than a hundred thousand pounds sterling a year to pay for purchases made in England and yet they produced locally only a few articles suitable for European markets, such as flaxseed, lumber, and cheese. Consequently it was necessary for them to compete with English shippers by trading in some roundabout fashion, chiefly through the West Indies, to secure the money and credit
