"An agency for the common weal": the Newfoundland Board of Trade, 1909-1915

Hong, Robert G. (1998) "An agency for the common weal": the Newfoundland Board of Trade, 1909-1915. Masters thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

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Abstract

This thesis examines the origins and early history of the Newfoundland Board of Trade and its role in the development of fisheries policy during the period 1909 to 1915, a period relatively unexplored by historians. Bridging a significant gap in the historiography, the thesis offers some insight into the controversial questions associated with government and merchant involvement in fisheries development, or the lack of it, during the critical period prior to World War I. This examination demonstrates that, contrary to the standard interpretation, the mercantile membership of the Board of Trade was genuinely concerned with the problems of a deteriorating fishery and responded to the difficulties by seeking an active role in the development of government policies. As a parallel movement to the Fishermen's Protective Union, which formed in direct response to the fishery crisis of 1907-08, the Board advanced a series of extensive reforms and initiated a number of practical strategies to ameliorate the worsening conditions related to standardization, production, markets, and shipping of Newfoundland's dominant export commodity. -- As well, the thesis examines the administration of Sir Edward Morris and its policies on the fisheries. It is argued that the government's failure to institute widespread fishery reforms was not so much a reflection of inertia or disinclination, but rather the result of extenuating economic, structural, and organizational constraints that limited its ability to effectively reform the fishery.

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