In 1959, after years of lobbying from Texas oil men, President Dwight Eisenhower imposed a quota on US crude oil imports. The idea of the world’s biggest oil importer putting up barriers to keep out foreign crude now seems ludicrous. With fuel shortages looming, the quotas were abandoned by Richard Nixon in spring 1973.

Yet the arguments marshalled in support of the quotas are all too familiar. Protecting the domestic industry was vital to national security, the oil men said: America needed to invest in production capacity in case foreign supplies were cut off.