Carey, HENRY CHARLES, political economist, was the son of Mathew Carey (1760-1839), a journalist and publisher, who in 1784 had emigrated from Ireland to Philadelphia, where Henry was born, 15th December 1793. He early became a partner in his father's bookselling business; and when in 1835 he retired from business to devote himself to his favourite study, he was at the head of the largest publishing concern in the United
States. He died 13th October 1879. His Principles of Political Economy (3 vols. 1837-40) had a marked influence on economic speculation. In 1838 he published The Credit System of France, Great Britain, and the United States; and in 1848, The Past, the Present, and the Future, a work marked by great vigour and originality. In 1853 appeared the Letters on International Copyright; in 1858-59, Principles of Social Science (3 vols.); in 1867, Review of the Decade 1857-67; and in 1872, The Unity of Law. The most important of these have been translated into most European languages. Carey was originally a zealous free-trader, but was ere long recognised as the head of a new school of political economy. According to his system, free trade was impossible in the existing state of American industry; it might be the ideal towards which the country should tend, but a period of protection was an indispensable stage in the progress toward it.