I think you have to look at the evidence. The Bible Societies of the early 19th Century, both American and English (the ones who use the KJV Bible) made a conscious decision to remove the Apocrypha, for the reasons I mentioned. It was unwanted by the Evangelicals and those near them in philosophy, and it was also cheaper to produce books without that section. It was basically a no-brainer for the Bible Societies who wanted every Christian (viz. Protestant) to have a bible in their possession. The private publishers in those times, DID continue to include the Apocrypha (or as mentioned above, made it “optional”,) but it was now becoming more and more controversial. Including it appeared to some to be Papistry. Those were just some of the reasons that the Apocrypha went into decline among Protestants. However no one publisher, or no one Protestant Church has or had the power to rule on the contents of Bibles. The Protestant Canon was settled by Martin Luther, and it basically stuck.
IOW, I am not BLAMING publishers. After all they are BUSINESSES, not concerned with religious debates. They want to SELL Bibles to the MOST people they can. If including the Apocrypha was bad for business they would naturally exclude them. Bible Societies on the other hand are quasi-religious in that they DO make decisions based on doctrinal issues (or at least perceptions) as well as economic ones. So that is why I think the Bible Societies played the major role in getting rid of the Apocrypha from KJV Bibles.
