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on one's credit were constant and real. And theywere exacerbated in febrile times like the late 1790s- the years of the Alien and Sedition Acts-by xenophobia. William Cobbett chose this moment to denounce Carey as a member of a secret Masonic Jacobin cabal known as the American Society of United Irishmen, dedicated to importing the French Revolution. Once again, reprinting was to the fore, with Cobbett seeking to erode Carey's credit by charging that he exemplified a general Irish nonchalance about "mine and thine," and Carey retaliating by displaying Cobbett's own borrowings from John Ward Fenno. Carey denied the conspiracy charge vigorously (but not entirely ingenuously), but for a moment he stood on the brink. He even announced publicly that he was selling up. But Jefferson's election as president came just in time to save him.40 Carey reaped the rewards of political patronage. He obtained a reliably lucrative contract to print laws, and became a director of the Bank of Pennsylvania, securing access to financial credit. Having lived at continual risk of bankruptcy, suddenly he need never face that peril again.

By now Careywas a leading figure in the book trade, successful enough to export to Europe. He could also afford to invest. A large dollop of capital went into a Bible, the type for which he bought from Hugh Gaine and kept standing for almost two decades. As that implies, the crisis had prompted him to take another momentous decision. He decided to sell his printing operation and concentrate his energies on publishing alone. From now on his ventures - both republications and originals -would be manufactured by printers hired for the task. In prospect was a profound reconfiguration. As in Europe, publishers were beginning to set themselves above artisans and retailers. By the same token, printers were beginning to see themselves as sharing more with artisans in other trades than with grandees in their own. The new publishers themselves, too, had to design novel ways of acting at a distance, including new approaches to credit and obligation. Most booksellers had hitherto dealt with predominantly local markets, connected, if at all, by precarious exchange agreements; but Carey's reach already extended far afield, especially to the south. He now built upon the networks he had established for the American Museum and from his own prodigious travels. From peripatetic agents like Mason Weems, through the many printers of Philadelphia, to prison inmates hired to make cartons, Carey's operation became a web of broad span. By about 181o, he thought, this style of operation had almost entirely replaced old-style subscriptions.41

As it expanded, however- as, in general, publishing became a national endeavor- so this kind of web triggered conflicts. The claims of publishers to particular titles and genres came into conflict when their markets merged. The result was a proliferation of piracy charges across the United States. The fragile and interweaved nature of credit made it essential, not just for individuals, but for the trade at large, that some mechanism be created for resolving these conflicts. The question that confronted Carey's peers after i8oo was thus one of political formation. How could they wrestle their various local practices, customs, and roles into a coherent, well-mannered national trade?42

"THE CONSTITUTION OF OUR LITERARY REPUBLIC"

Carey's journey from Ireland was far from unique. Since 1720, over a hundred thousand had made the same voyage. In mid-1784 three hundred artisans and their families left Dublin in one ship alone, and similar numbers were on board two more that weighed anchor within a week or two of Carey's. He had done his bit to spur the exodus, issuing from his cell an exhortation to emigrate. The United States, he thought, offered land and freedom. And for a bookman there were other incentives too. The London booksellers were exploiting the end of perpetual copyright in their own kingdom to create cheap editions, narrowing the field for Dublin's reprinters. Even before the Act of Union,