Carriage in French ships is required for the trade between Algeria nd France and for practically all the imports from Tunis. All other Dods are entitled to preferential treatment in France or in Tunis or the ther colonies only if carried "directly" from their places of origin. The differential features. Preferences in the colonies: In the ssimilated colonies, which include most of those which are important, he high protective tariff of France is applied with some reductions, elatively few, decreed by the French Council of State. These cusoms duties are discriminatory to the full extent of their amount, as hey are levied in full on foreign products and are not levied at all on rench and French colonial products. In the special régime colonies the percentage of discrimination in avor of French goods is equally great, but the absolute amount of liscrimination is less, since the rates of the special (individual) -ariffs are lower than those of the French tariff. However, this 100 >er cent discrimination applies only to the customs duties, and in all of these colonies there are levied additional duties which fall equally on a longer or shorter list of goods regardless of origin, so that many French products pay imposts which are often considerable. To generalize roughly, these charges on French goods amount usually to less than one-half of the total charges levied on foreign goods, i. e., the octroi de mer and other consumption duties are generally less in amount than are the customs duties. In the open-door colonies there are no tariff discriminations. The trade of these colonies in the period 1909-1913 was 15.75 per cent of the total colonial trade, excluding that of Algeria. With one exception, the comparatively important export duties of Indo-China are not levied on exports to France. The special advantages which France enjoys in the assimilated and special régime colonies are enjoyed equally by all the French colonies except French India. Preferences in France: In the French market the assimilated colonies enjoy a preference of the full amount of the tariff, except that on sugars and peppers the preferences are less, about one-fifth on the former and one-third on the latter. These preferences to the colonies are the more important because "a great number of rates in that [the French] tariff are fixed solely for the benefit of the colonies." The open-door and special régime colonies receive a preference in the French market on sugars,63 and some of their products receive reductions or exemptions. The increases of the minimum tariff rates, enacted in 1910, have not yet been applied to the products of these colonies. Colonial exports are exempt from the sales tax of 1920. Preferences to French shipping: As to navigation, French ships must be used in all trade between France and Algeria. The same rule also applies to goods imported from Tunis and enjoying tariff favors in France. In all other cases preferential treatment is made conditional, in France and in the colonies, on direct transportation. The direct transportation may be in French or on foreign ships. "Direct" is not in all cases construed strictly, and during the war preferences to French shipping were relaxed or suspended. Doubtless other factors contribute, but that these restrictions are not without effect is strongly evidenced by the figures presented in the Tableau Général du Commerce et de la Navigation published by the French customs administration. First of all, foreign vessels are wholly excluded from the Algerian trade with France. In 1913 this trade amounted to 9,300,000 metric quintals from France to Algeria and almost 11,000,000 quintals in the opposite direction. The trade between France and all other colonies except Morocco was 27,750,000 quintals, so that this law deprived foreign vessels of all chance to compete in a trade which is almost four-ninths 65 of the total colonial trade with France as meas ured by weight. Secondly, French vessels carried (in 1913) from France to the col onies, including Tunis but not Algeria or Morocco, 6,700,000 quintals as compared with 460,000 carried in foreign vessels. As foreign vessels carried only 6.42 per cent of the total it appears without further analysis that they were not greatly benefited by the fact that the rule of direct importation did not apply to all the goods carried. Thirdly, French vessels brought in 1913 from the French colonies again excluding Algeria and Morocco, 10,110,000 quintals, whil foreign vessels brought 8,423,000. These figures in the gross show that foreign ships had nearly one-half of this inward carrying trade. in spite of the French restriction. But it must be remembered that the restriction regarding direct importation does not apply to all the goods brought from the colonies. It applies only to goods which claim the benefit of reduced tariff rates. A product of an assimilated colony can receive no favor when similar products from other places enter free. A product of a nonassimilated colony entering France at the minimum rate can receive no favor if the tariff provides only that one rate for that product of no matter what origin. Such goods, therefore, may stop at any and all ports and still enter free or at the minimum duty as the case may be. The so-called warehousing surtaxes of Table D of the French tariff apply to these products only if they have been discharged in a European port. Scrutiny of the returns of the imports brought in 1913 by foreign vessels from the colonies to France, discloses that five-sevenths of the total 8,423,000 quintals consisted of articles to which the rule of direct transportation does not apply; and that foreign vessels were practically excluded from transporting to France colonial products to which the rule does apply, with the exception of rice and cereals from Indo-China and sugar from Martinique and Guadeloupe. The tables do not show whether in these cases the foreign vessels made the transportation direct or whether the additional duty was paid; nor do they show whether the importation in foreign vessels of stones and earths from Tunis, an item that accounts for nearly one-half the weight imported in foreign vessels, was indirect; i. e., whether the rule of direct transportation if applied to these articles would in any degree affect adversely the carrying trade of foreign vessels. The tables do show, however, that the 18,533,000 quintals of total imports to France from the colonies, excluding Algeria and Morocco, may be divided into three large classes. The first consists of articles to which the rule of direct transportation does not apply, and it includes more than one-half by weight of the total importation. In this class→→→ taking indeed only the larger items-foreign vessels brought 5,830,000 65 But, of course, this fraction would be greatly reduced if the figures for ton-miles could be used, and even that reduction would not represent accurately the relative profit in carrying the trade. quintals while French vessels brought 4,185,000, making a proportion of four to three in favor of the foreign vessels. The second class, including one-fifth of the total, is made up of the few items to which the rule applies but where foreign vessels have shown themselves able to compete rice and cereals from IndoChina, and sugar from the Antilles. Of this trade, the foreign vessels carried 2,393,000 quintals, while French ships brought 1,512,000 quintals, a proportion of three to two, again in favor of the foreign ships. The third class comprises the rest of the trade-mainly trade to which the rule applies, but including minor items which on closer analysis might go into class 1 and further items which lose their identity in the tables under the heading "all other articles." It will be observed that the trade of many of the colonies falls wholly in this class. In it the foreign vessels share to the extent of 200,000 quintals, while French vessels carry the bulk, 4,413,000 quintals. Foreign vessels carry 4.5 per cent of this trade. To conclude, in classes 1 and 2, where the foreign vessels can compete, they have 59 per cent of the carrying trade. In the third class, to which may be added the whole of the export trade to the colonies, their share is not much over 5 per cent. Table 3 gives the figures upon which these conclusions are based. The line drawn below the item raw hides from Indo-China indicates the end of class I. The totals to that point in the columns "selected products" are 5,830,000 and 4,185,000; the four remaining items in those columns form class II and total 2,393,000 and 1,512,000. TABLE 3.-Imports by weight of colonial products into France in French and foreign vessels, 1913.1 Co m M p a union 68 were (in 1884 and 1885) induced by threats and promises to vote new duties on foreign goods. As a reward for their com ta pliance a rebate of 12 per cent of the French tariff was granted to colonial sugars and seven francs per 100 kilograms was added to the rate on foreign sugars. Of the other colonies, whose councils had received no power of making tariffs, Indo-China, Gaboon, Guiana, and St. Pierre and Miquelon were given differential tariffs." All merchandise was to pay duties in Gaboon, but French goods were granted a rebate of 20 per cent in 1883, 60 per cent in 1884, andexcept alcohol and arms-70 100 per cent from January 1, 1891. French goods entering Indo-China were granted in 1886 a rebate of one-half of the duties which were generally at the rate of 5 per cent. In St. Pierre and Miquelon a previous tariff was restored in 1889 and in the following year in Guiana a new charge of 4 per cent for foreign goods was added to the general rate of 3 per cent previously levied on all goods, including French." 71 Assimilation of tariffs under the law of 1892.-Under the law of January 11, 1892, the tariffs of Indo-China, Martinique, Reunion, Guadeloupe, New Caledonia, Guiana, and Gaboon were assim lated to that of France. From that date these colonies have had free trade with each other and with France and have presented the French tariff as a barrier to the trade of the outside world. The Comoro Islands were added in 1896 to the list of assimilated colonies; and Madagascar was added in 1897.72 All of the colonies assimilated in 1892 except New Caledonia already had tariffs which discriminated in favor of French goods, but now the amount of preference was increased. The rates of the French tariff had been used sparingly hitherto in the colonies; the usual rates were 4, 6, or 10 per cent, while there were a few as high as 15 or 20 per cent. But now the full French rates--at that very time being revised upward-were applied. The outstanding features of the colonial tariff system of 1892, together with the modifications introduced since that date, are set forth in the following paragraphs. FEATURES OF THE SYSTEM. (i) French goods enter assimilated colonies duty free.In the assimilated colonies no customs duties are levied on French goods or on goods which have been nationalized by the payment of duties in France, if the shipment is direct," whatever the flag under which the merchandise is carried.. This free importation of French goods is not mentioned in the law of 1892, but is based on the Senatus-Consultum of July 4, 1865, which legalized the distinction between the terms "customs duty," that is, the duty paid only by foreign goods, and other duties such as the octrois de mer which are paid equally by goods of all origins. Such local consumption duties exist in all the colonies and French goods have never been exempt from them. These councils had, as French protectionists expressed it, abused their powers under the Senatus 70 These retained the 60 per cent rebate. 71 See Girault: Op. cit., pp. 90-92, and Trescher: Op. cit., pp. 78-83. 72 Diego-Suarez (since 1885 a French colony on the island of Madagascar), the island of Nossi Bé, and the island of Ste. Marie had been placed under the authority of the governor general of Madagascar in 1896. The Comoro Islands came under the same jurisdiction in 1914. 73 The requirement of direct shipment was greatly relaxed during the war. See c. g. Supplement to Commerce Reports, No. 72b, Mar. 3, 1920; The Times Trade Supplement, Sept., 1916, p. 121. N f t t Goods manufactured or elaborated in bond in France pay on imporation into these colonies as they would if taken out of bond for consumption in France, that is, according to the amount of foreign naterial contained in them, except in the Antilles (Guadeloupe and Martinique) and Reunion where they enter free." (ii) French colonial goods enter French colonies duty free.--All products of any French colony, whether assimilated or not, are admitted free to all other colonies.75 The only exception 76 is that goods coming from French India pay the rates accorded to goods of the most-favored nation, save that 2,000,000 kilograms of longcloth up to No. 26 French, and 1,500,000 kilograms of yarn not beyond No. 20 French may enter the other colonies " from French India duty free, provided they are made from yarn from Pondicherry. Foreign goods imported into a French colony through another French colony pay in the second the difference in the tariff rates, if the latter has the higher rate on the goods in question.78 (iii) Foreign goods entering assimilated colonies pay the rates of the French tariff, except where special rates have been established for them by decree. Decrees changing rates for individual colonies have introduced variety into the colonial tariffs," but the Government has been "preoccupied much more with realizing the intentions and the aim pursued by the authors of the law of January 11, 1892, than with attending to the advice given by the local councils."80 Jules Ferry advanced the view that this power of decree should be used to give each colony a tariff suited to its needs; but this principle, if embodied in practice at all, has been followed in the spirit of explanations offered in the Chamber of 1891-that exceptions should be made only for articles of the first necessity or for products which France could not furnish.81 . The increases made from time to time in the French tariff schedules do not go into effect automatically in the assimilated colonies, but only after they have been proclaimed in each colony. This point has been of special importance since June, 1919, for the increases have been very numerous; only a few of them, however, have as yet (October, 1921) been applied in the colonies (See p. 156). All of these decrees which have changed the rates for individual colonies have specified that the surtaxes on goods of a European country imported through another European country, and on nonEuropean goods through a country of Europe 82 should not apply in these colonies. (iv) Exceptions to the French tariff in assimilated colonies are decreed by the French executive.-The tariffs of the assimilated colonies are made, since they are the tariffs of France, by the French legislaProvision is made, however, for exceptions in the application of the French tariff to the colonies. The determination of exceptional rates might, of course, have been left to the action of the French 14 Law of May 16, 1863. By Art. V of the law of 1892. Te Introduced in 1904. The New Hebrides and the protectorates of Tunis and Morocco are not colonies within the meaning of this law. 78 Law of Jan. 11, 1892, Art. V. 19 Although most of the schedules have been practically unaffected. See descriptions of schedules below, |