New-York tribune., 1901-12-29
GERMAN COLONIES AND TARIFF.
INTERESTING REPORTS FROM AMERICAN
CONSUIS.

Washington Dec. 2.-The State Department has
received from Mr.. Harris, consular agent at Eioen-
stock. an interesting report on German colonial
enterprises Mr.. Harris quotes from speech de-
lvered by Dr. Vosberg- -Rekow. director OF the Ger
man Bureau for the Preparation of Commercial
Treaties before the merchants OF LEIPZIG fol-
lows
It is evident that we can never give up our pres
Gus efforts being made to become a great sea
farge scale We nust Strive 10 expand our spheres
OF Interest and inst in people the conscious
only by the annexation of territory beyond the
seas the m Of our 0 G0ones ne M the that
we may ever hope to be IN postion not TO bp o
produce within the borders of the home country.
Mr. Harris points out that. while the territory
comprised in all OF the German colonies abroad
amounts to 2,557 900 square miles not single one
Of these colonies is self-supporting. The total In
of the colonies for 1900 from tariff duties and
the like amounted IS 40 while the deficit it
is said reached s6,977922. The ideal relations be-
tween a colony and the mother country, says Mr..
Harris those which permit the colony to pro-
duce the material. which the mother country re-
ceives and sends back in a manufactured state but
in accordance with Irresistible law of economics.
a colony with great material resources will emanci-
pate itself gradually from the mother country 1T Is
doubtful, however," continues Mr. Harris. whether
this will shortly be of any of the present colo
nes of Germany" In almost every part of the
world, 1t is said where Germanys acquisitions are
situated, there is in the immediate neghborhood a
colony of Great Britain of some other country,
which is able to produce colonial products.
Great Britain" says Mr.. Harris. ''either directly
or through the medium of her colonies, has a
nopoy of almost half the commerce of the German
dependencies"
The commercial DEVELOPMENT Of German South
west Africa, Mr.. Harris says. will day prob
ably be retarded by the competition and aggres-
siveness of Cape Colony. Tables submitted
showing that Germanys shgre in the exports of
her own colonies is only so per cent while of all
the products required by her dependencies the
mother country supplies only about 50 per cent
In the proposed German tariff the distinc-
ton between coarse and fine shoes. as drawn at
present will not be applied, according to Consul
General Hughes at Coburg. in a report to the
State Department. Mr. Hughes says that expert
ence has taught the German officials that the ar
rangement does not guarantee sure classification
of goods, and that fine shoes occasionally would
rates of duty. The Consul General says that the
Importation of leather shoes into Germany in
creases year by year. and II foreign competition
does not yet mean danger foy the home trade the
Germans think that. in the absence of sufficient
protection il is by no means impossible that their
market may be flooded with foreign shoes In
fact he saws they note that n start in that drec-
ton already has been made. especially from the
United States. Besides the growth of foreign COM
most kinds of foreign top leather for shoes calls
for the advance of the rates on shoes, according
to German ideas.
Monaghan, Chemntz. a report giving some in
teresting statistics in regard to the machine trade
of the leading countries. According to the table,
England, the United States and Germany are the
most important exporting countries. In France
and Austria Hungary there is an unusually large
consul, American manufacturers should not lose
sight.