doubtless the percentage of her growth would have been even more
unfavorable. As it was, the rise of new manufactures helped to save
her from becoming an entirely stationary section. In the course of
the preceding two decades, New England's shipping industry had
reached an extraordinary height, by reason of her control of the
neutral trade during the European wars. The close of that period saw
an apparent decline in her relative maritime power in the Union, but
the shipping and commercial interests were still strong. New England
possessed half the vessels owned in the United States and over half
the seamen. Massachusetts alone had a quarter of the ships of the
nation and over a third of the sailors. [Footnote: Pitkin,
Statistical View (ed. of 1835), 350.] Of the exports of the United
States in 1820, the statistics gave to New England about twenty per
cent., nine-tenths of which were from Massachusetts. [Footnote:
Shaler, United States, I., chap, x.; MacGregor, Commercial
Statistics of America, 41, 58, 63, 72, 126, 133.] This is rather an
under-estimate of the share of New England, because a portion of the
commerce fitted out by her capital and her ships sought the harbor
of New York.

Great as was New England's interest in the commercial policy of the
United States, the manufactures of the section rose to such
importance in the course of this decade that the policy of the
section was divided. The statistics of the manufactures of the
United States at the beginning and at the end of the period were so
defective that little dependence can be placed upon them for
details. But the figures for New England were more complete than for
the other regions; the product of her cotton mills increased in
value from two and one-half million dollars in 1820 to over fifteen
and one-half millions in 1831; and her woolen products rose from