The Sun.
London, England, 1848-01-03 00:00:00

THE ZOLLVEREIN - PROTEC
TION VERSUS FREE TRADE.

(Continued from The Sun of Saturday.)
Now, to consider the second question—" Will the
means lead to the desired end ? will differential
duties increase the direct trade ?" It cannot be in-
tended to force matters to the highest point, and to
require, for instance, that Bremen instead of being
content with the former 92 per cent. of her direct
imports of tobacco, or Hamburgh, instead of resting
satisfied with the former 92 per cent., of her direct
sugar imports, Mould in future fetch the remaining
8 per cent. also from trans-Atlantic countries. It can-
not be the intention entirely to exclude all indirect
trade, for then it would be much more simple to
prohibit it at once. It is therefore simply a
question as to the greater or less probability
that differential duties would ;cause a con.
siderable increase in the direct importation of
some one or other commodity. In order to judge of ,
such probabilities, it is necessary to enter into many
details, which may however again he limited to the
principal:trans-Atlantic productions, not only because,
according to the declared views of most of the advo-
cates of tkie system, it is on these articles only that
the additional duties ought to be imposed, but because
they in fact preponderate so much over all other arti-
cles, that what is applicable to them must be consi-
dered as the measure of the whole question. We have
further to consider with regard hereto, how, accord-
ing to what has been said above, differential duties are
to be made to operate against the importation of non-
European produce from England ah Netherlands,
from France and Belgium, from Spain and Portugal.
Such importations from the Peninsula and from
France, with the exception of the cotton imports from
Havre, are so insignificant at present, that they may
be left entirely out of the question ; there remains,
therefore, only Great Britain, Holland, and Belgium.
It is, above all, the Netherlands whose commercial
policy gives the Germans cause for complaint, and
against whom differential duties are to be particularly
directed. It is indeed not to be denied that the
amount of German goods carried by Holland*
across the Ocean, stand in no proportion to the mass
of colonial produce which Germany imports indirectly
from the Netherlands. Of the 9,500,0001 b. of coffee
which were in 1845 imported into Hamburgh from
European ports, nearly 6,000,0001b5. came from the
Netherlands. This was all, no doubt, Java coffee.
Thirteen per cent. also of the coffee imports into
Bremen from European ports, was most likely
Java coffee, imported from the Netherlands. Of
the 45,000 cwt. of coffee brought to Stettin from
European ports, not German, 43,000 came from
the Netherlands, independent of the importa-
tions by means of Rhine and by land. That Java
coffee so seldom comes direct from Java to German
ports, is to be ascribed to the commercial laws of the
Netherlands, which impose an export duty of five
florins per pecul on all exports of coffee from Java to
foreign ports, whilst Dutch ships, which must give
security that they will really take their cargoes to
Holland, only have to pay two florins. Here again
we must start from the supposition (which shall be
snore fully explained in the sequel) that Germany
will not be able to produce any change in the co-
lonial policy of the Netherlands, so that in every,
case to impose a differential duty on the indirect im-
portation of coffee from the Netherlands into Ger-
many will be the same as imposing a differential duty
on Java coffee in general; and the question is, there-
fore, whether the imposition of such duty would
materially increase the direct importation of other

kinds of Coffee.
If we consider how indispensable Java coffee is
for Germany, the question is at once answered in the
negative. The reason why it must be considered in-
dispensable is to be sought partly in its peculiar
qualities, partly in the immense quantity of it which
is already required for the consumption of the states
of the Zollverein. Experience teaches us that wherever
this coffee, which in delicacy of flavour surpasses most
American and particularly Brazilian coffee, is known,
it soon supplants even the cheaper sorts of the latter.
The small number of American colonies which pro-
duce coffee equal to the Java, and even superior to it,
will nevertheless not be able to furnish a substitute
for it, as their production is so very limited. The
proposed differential duties would, therefore, in all
probability, serve to increase the price, but not to dimi-
nish the consumption of Java coffee, which is even now
considerably on the increase, notwithstanding the
high price at which it is held. We must also remem-
ber that a difference of two Prussian dollars in duty,
is, for instance, not equal to a difference of two Prus-
sian dollars in price, for the increased freight of the
favoured national ships, the rise in price which would
take place in the producing American countries, owing
to the artificial measures resorted to by us, and per-
haps also the cost of transport from those more distant
countries, would considerably reduce the former two
Prussian dollars. Besides, it is a question whether,
independent of quality, a satisfactory substitute as to
quality could he found. Regarding the consump-
tion of Java coffee in Germany, we have indeed no
exact returns; according to the notices in
Table XI., it may, however, be calculated to
amount to between 50,000,000 and 60,000,000
Founds, which are pertly imported through Belgium
and Holland, partly through the ports of the North
Sl.a and the Baltic. If this immense quantity should
et once he excluded from Germany, we car., in truth,
not conceive whence a substitute could be derived, as
the production of the American countries has never
yet exceeded the yearly consumption. Table XI.
gives further particulars as to the proportions between
the production and the consumption of coffee. Brazil
supplies 160,000,000, Java 130,000,000, all other
producing countries together only 135,000,000 lbs.;
the colonial product of Holland thus also, in regard
to quantity, exercises a most decisive influence as to
price. The unprecedentedly low coffee prices are
entirely owing to the enormous supplies furnished by
the Dutch East India colonies, and the year 1846
furnishes us with an example, that merely the tem-
porary reserve of the abundance of Java coffee, by
the Handelsmaatchappy, sufficed to raise the price
of every kind of coffee from fifteen to twenty per
cent. If we further consider that in general,
out more particularly in the Zollverein countries,
the consumption of coffee increases considerably every
year, and in a far greater proportion than the produc-
tion out of Java, and that such an increase of produc-
tion in the American countries as would be required
to satisfy the demand created in Germany by the ex-
clusion of Java coffee, could not be expected to take
place, particularly as it is dependent on so many con-
ditions, such as the productive powers of the soil, and
also that it is restrained by the circumstance that coffee
plantations do not yield a full crop before the fourth
or fifth year, we must allow that with regard to
quantity, Java coffee is indispensable • unless, indeed,
we would run the risk of allowing the prices ofcoffee
in general to rise to such a height in Germany as
would considerably reduce the consumption, and thus
equally injure the public and the trade. To
the Netherlands the result of this measure might
indeed be an increased sale, if, for instance, in conse-
quence of the increased consumption of American
aoffee, in the German countries on the Rhine, the
supplies of these sorts of coffee in the north German
man ports should be diminished and enhanced in price,
and the Scandinavian countries and Russia, which
have hitherto not consumed great quantities of Java
coffee, should thereby be induced to adopt this more
delicately flavoured coffee ; or if, which is of still
treater importance, the consumption of Java coffee in
north America should be increased. In addition to
this the very excess of the additional duty might be
the means of rendering it ineffectual ; for (supposing
that the produce of countries out of Europe are only
to be subject to the differential duty when imported
from European ports) to avoid the duty it would only
be necessary to bring the coffee to Germany by the
circuitous route via North America.t
From all that we have said concerning coffee, it
does, indeed, result that the: differential duties, if
jaw, would prove inefficient, and if high, would
operate injuriously ; yet with regard to the first ob-
ject proposed and directed against the Netherlands,
they might, nevertheless, succeed in diminishing the
imports of this article from English ports, and in
bringing a few more cargoes-directly into our ports.
The imports from England are, however, as it is,
It
and are yearly decreasing in
vory
ant and the introduction of so stringent a mea-
imposition of differential duties could
btehjeustified on the plea of so insignificant a
hardly sai 11:Ir °e a s
result .
sugar the case is reversed. This
As regards raw
commodity we receive in greater quantities from
rwsglish than from Dutch ports, and the indirect im-
ports, which are at present proportionately not very
considerable, will probably increase in future,
should the new facilities lately granted to this
trade in England (namely, the unimpeded ad-
mission of slave-grown sugar into that country),
occasion an unusual supply of sugar, and a consequent
glutting of the English markets. Should it, however,
then, as it is now, in many cases, still be more advan-
tageous for the German sugar-refiners to purchase
their supplies of the raw materials in those markets,
instead of supplying themselves with that which is
imported direct, it cannot certainly be intended -to
introduce artificial measures to deprive the refiners of
this advantage, and to raise the price of the raw ma-

That Holland herself, with her wealthy population,
zeoustomed to every luxury, and having no considerable
manufactures of her own, consumes a great amount of
German manufactures, is ,generally, though improperly,
overlooked.
An additional duty, for instance, of only two Prus-
sian dollars per 1001bs. would amount to 80 marks batten.
OD one ton of 2,0001b5., whilst the freight from Holland
tt. North America, and back to Hamburgb, would
amount to 42 marks banco, the insurance (at three per
aims ,t0,,,15 marks banco, and the loss of interest for six
641 marks banco, making together 69 marks
hus by taking the coffee by this circuitous
• ••,•K`.... -• '1 route a profit of 11 marks banco might be
17,
'lOll, ••

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