Tench Coxe was the first American economic theorist to propound a truly national vision. Because of his appreciation of the young nation's industrial potential, he has come to be recognized as a theorist who early foresaw technology's potential for transforming the American economy and perceived, however dimly, its mythic meaning for the emergent society.

The son of William and Mary Francis Coxe, Coxe was born into a well-placed Philadelphia family with distinguished English antecedents. After attending but not graduating from the College of Pennsylvania, he was introduced into a business career when he joined the mercantile firm in which his father was a partner; here he first gained the understanding of business and finance that was to inform his plans for America's development. Although Coxe had shown clear Loyalist sympathies during the Revolution, he was chosen a Whig representative to the Annapolis Convention of 1786 and the Continental Congress...