The American Institute and the Problem of Interest Group Mobilization in Antebellum United States

This article explores the formation and early history of the American Institute of the City of New-York, which in the 1830s became the leading lobby association of “friends of industry” in the United States. More specifically, the article considers how the institute’s officers sought to overcome obstacles of collective mobilization that had plagued earlier pro-industry associations. Pre–Civil War interest groups is an understudied area, and historians typically depict the years following in the Compromise of 1833 as a period essentially devoid of pro-industry agitation. However, it was in precisely in these years that friends of industry for the first time managed to obtain the resources necessary for sustained mobilization. Key to the American Institute’s success, this article argues, was the development of annual manufacturing fairs, events that provided steady revenue, strengthened internal cohesion, attracted new members, facilitated coordination with like-minded groups, and provided opportunities to engage in popular politics in an ordered manner.