of 1824 increased tariffs to protect the American industry in the face of cheaper imported commodities such as iron products, wool, and cotton textiles, and agricultural goods from England. This tariff was the first in which the sectional interests of the North and the South truly came into conflict because the South advocated lower tariffs to take advantage of tariff reciprocity from England and other countries that purchased raw agricultural materials from the South. The Tariff of 1828, also known as the Tariff of Abominations, and the Tariff of 1832 accelerated sectionalism between the North and the South. For a brief moment in 1832, South Carolina made vague threats to leave the Union over the tariff issue. In 1833, to ease North-South relations, Congress lowered the tariffs. In the 1850s, the South gained greater influence over tariff policy and made subsequent reductions. In 1861, just before the Civil War, Congress enacted the Morrill Tariff, which applied high rates and inaugurated a period of relatively continuous trade protection in the United States that lasted until the Underwood Tariff of 1913. The schedule of the Morrill Tariff and its two successor bills were retained long after the end of the Civil War. Early 20th century protectionism In 1921, Congress sought to protect local agriculture as opposed to the industry bypassing the Emergency Tariff, which increased rates on wheat, sugar, meat, wool and other agricultural products brought into the United States from foreign nations, which protected domestic producers of those items. However, one year later Congress passed another tariff, the Fordney–McCumber Tariff, which applied the scientific tariff and the American Selling Price. The purpose of the scientific tariff was to equalize production costs among countries so that no country could undercut the prices charged by American companies. The difference in production costs was calculated by the Tariff Commission. A second novelty was the American Selling Price. This allowed the president to calculate the duty based on the price of the American price of a good, not the imported good. During the outbreak of the Great Depression in 1930, Congress raised tariffs via the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act on over 20,000 imported goods to record levels, and, in the opinion of most economists, worsened the Great Depression by causing other countries to reciprocate, thereby plunging American imports and exports by more than half. Era of GATT and WTO In 1948, the US signed the General