Abominable Tariffs #5: Printing Technology

 

Fools' Square by Jeanne Arnieri

The whole tariff debacle grows more confusing by the day. 

A federal appeals court late Friday held that the current president does not have the authority to impose taxes on imports. Rather that is Congress's authority. 

"The ruling is a major setback for the White House and it threatens to stall much of [the] second-term agenda," according to reporters Jacob Bogage & Emily Davies. Well, we shall see, but no matter what happens tariffs or import taxes are not going to bring back the American fine cotton printing industry.

In the last post we looked at agricultural reasons the U.S. no longer produces fine Sea Island cotton here. In this final post on tariffs we'll look at manufacturing.

King McKinley and his tariffs

Some economists believe tariff taxes on imported goods encourage domestic manufacturing. These "Protectionists" tell us that less international trade is better for American business. Here's reason #2 why we cannot produce quality cotton prints in the United States.

Dark shading indicates a nation taxed by American tariffs in August, 2025

John Maynard Keynes irritating a lorry driver

Another belief system advocates Keynesian economics, "unfettered free trade."

As President Harry Truman once said...

On one hand and then on the other....

Eight Hands Around by Jeanne Arnieri

It's a philosophical difference.

If Truman had 8 economists he'd probably have 8 opinions as we do today.

So how will the 2025 tariffs benefit cotton production in the American industrial system?

Here's information about printing technology and the slim chances of its return to American borders.

Empty Textile Mills

We abandoned our American textile technology in the last quarter of the 20th century. I wrote regularly for Quilters Newsletter back then and publisher Bonnie Leman asked me to do a story on why the U.S. quilt fabric mills like Cranston were closing. I phoned people at mills north and south, talking to the public relations office or sometimes, it seems, the last person in the building still answering the telephone.

The interviews indicated that American infrastructure and machinery for roller printing cotton could not compete with new technology that Asian nations were developing. Japan, South Korea, etc. saw the future---computerized screen printing. Their governments subsidized what would become a pillar of their economies. 

Roller printing once done in those obsolete American mills is long gone.

 Most of the fabric you buy today is screen-printed in digitized production lines.

Forty years ago enterprising nations began building factories and subsidizing the development of the new, computerized screen technology that replaced old roller printing machinery. They realized that profit from fabric production was beneficial to their national interests and worth the investment.

This was in the 1980s as I recall. Conservative American economists reversing the hated "Heavy Hand of Government" were opposed to any similar federal subsidies for our textile printing industry. If industry could not make it on their own let them quit. Which they did.

The lack of support snowballed....

Alma Carrigan was one of the last employees to

work in the Chicopee Mills cotton spinning room in 1975

before the New Hampshire mill closed.

 Did we ever publish a Quilters Newsletter story on the mill closings? I don't recall but I'd guess we decided it was too depressing and too political for an upbeat quilt magazine.

Some surviving mill buildings have been re-purposed as housing,

a good use for our architectural heritage, 

but not one that will bring back American textile production.

As things stand today: We are just going to have to pay more for our fine cotton prints. 

Founder Benjamin Franklin by David Martin

As Franklin wrote in 1789: 

"Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes." 

As things stand this weekend

1912 Puck

Food prices go up with tariffs too (See Mexico above.)

Puck Magazine had a lot to say.

The 20th & last pieced block for the

"Tariffs & Troubles" sampler.

Jeanne Arnieri's top...No templates.

Twelve of the 20 blocks.

See the first four posts on import taxes and quilters' cotton:

https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2025/08/abominable-tariffs1-free-trade.html

https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2025/08/abominable-tariffs2-civil-war.html

https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2025/08/abominable-tariffs-3-de-minimus-import.html

https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2025/08/abominable-tariffs4-domestic-cotton_0520044382.html