Harvard. Final exams for European and U.S. Economic History. Gay and Klein, 1911

This post adds  final examinations for the 1910-11 academic year to previous posts dedicated to two economic history courses taught by Edwin F. Gay during the second decades of the twentieth century at Harvard. 

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Instructors: Edwin F. Gay, Julius Klein

Biographical information

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Reading list: First term, 1910-11.
Economics 6a.

European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century.

Final exam. First term, 1910-11.
Economics 6a.

[European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century]

1. (a) “The essence of the industrial revolution is the substitution of competition for the mediaeval regulations which had previously controlled the production and distribution of wealth….Competition came to be believed in as a gospel.” (Toynbee.)
   Give illustrations of the substitution of competition, and state why, in your opinion, the good rather than the evil of competition was emphasized at this period.
   (b) Toynbee said: “The effects of the industrial revolution prove that free competition may produce wealth without producing well-being.” A Boston reformer, speaking of the advent of machinery, says, “The profits from the machine were absorbed by capital,” so that the people did not have their share. Does the economic history of the nineteenth century support these views?
2. (a) Trace concisely the influence of agricultural interests upon the tariff history of England, France and Germany in the nineteenth century.
   (b) Has England been more affected by the agricultural depression of the last thirty years than other European countries? Why has it not been more influenced by the “protectionist reaction?”
3. How has the French railroad policy differed from that of Prussia? Which has been the more beneficial? Give reasons.
4. Do the actual conditions warrant the assertions concerning “the ominous situation of British trade?” Give reasons.
5. State succinctly the chief facts concerning:—
   (a) Assignats.
   (b) British shipping subsidies.
   (c) Crisis of 1857.

Source: Harvard University Archives, Examination papers, Mid-years (HUC 7000.55). Box 8, Examination Papers, Mid-years, 1910-11.

cf. Final exam. First term, 1914-15.
Economics 2a.

European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century.

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Reading list: Second term, 1910-11.
Economics 6b.

Economic and Financial History of the United States.

 

Final exam: Second term, 1910-11.
Economics 6b.

[Economic and Financial History of the United States]

1. Outline fully the topics you would discuss if you were to write a thesis on the history of the iron and steel industry in the United States.
2. Comment on the following:—
   1. “We import annually millions of dollars’ worth of tropical products that could be grown in the United States.” (Report of Secretary of Agriculture for 1901.)
   2. “The sum paid by American producers and manufacturers to these foreign bottoms during the past year was $500,000,000, a sum sufficient to dig the Panama Canal and operate it for twenty years. Remember that all this good American money has gone into the pockets of foreigners.” (Admiral Evans in a recent magazine article.)
3. (a) Outline our tariff history since 1890.
   (b) Comment on Senator Aldrich’s statement: “I do not believe there are any duties levied in this bill [the tariff act of 1909] that are excessive or are prohibitory.”
   (c) The American experience with reciprocity. Are you in favor of the reciprocity treaty with Canada? State your reasons.
4. Rhodes in his history of the United States says: “This tendency [the accumulation of large fortunes and the development of abject poverty] had begun before the War and has been the result rather of the constantly deteriorating character of the European immigration than of industrial changes on our own soil.”
   Do you agree with this view? Give your reasons.
5. Comment on the following: “The year 1896 was in fact one of those periods rare in the history of any country of which it could be said that a given chapter had definitely closed and that another was about to open.”
6. Compare briefly the conditions before and after the Civil War in respect to
   1. The defects of our banking system;
   2. The public land policy;
   3. Governmental assistance to and control of transportation enterprise.

Source: Papers set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics, …, Landscape Architecture, Music in Harvard College. June 1911, p. 44. In Harvard University Archives, Examination papers, 1873-1915 (HUC 7000.25). Box 9. Examination Papers, 1910-11.

cf. Final Exam. Second term, 1914-15.

Economics 2b
Economic and Financial History of the United States.

Image Source: Edwin Francis Gay and Julius Klein, respectively, from The World’s Work, Vol. XXVII, No. 5 (March 1914) and Harvard Album 1920.