No. 340.
Mr. Frelinghuysen to Mr. Baker.

No. 187.]

Sir: I transmit, herewith, copy of a communication addressed to me by many prominent trading houses of New York, concerning the present discriminating duty of 30 per cent., in addition to the regular tariff charges, which is collected in Venezuelan ports on goods bound thither from the United States, and transhipped while in transit at Curaçoa or any other West Indian port.

The Department’s instructions for more than a year past, both to Mr. Carter and to yourself, have shown the lively interest with which this matter is viewed by this government, and the desire felt and repeatedly expressed that a remedy should be urged for a state of things entirely inconsistent with the prosecution of honest commerce and the building up of the intimate commercial relationship between the United States and Venezuela which is so much to the interest of both countries. Your dispatches on the subject have shown a hopeful spirit on the part of the Venezuelan Government that justice might be done in this matter.

It is thought to be self-evident that whatever abuses the revenues of Venezuela may have to fear from irregular channels of trade cannot exist as between that country and the United States in the presence of a wise legislation there, providing that through invoices of shipments, certified by the consuls of Venezuela in the United States, and verified by the like officers in the port of transhipment.

Commerce by way of transhipment and transit is on many routes of international intercourse recognized as an indispensable fact, to be regulated [Page 542] and facilitated by judicious legislation. A prohibitory measure, like that of which we have so abundant cause to complain, cannot but be injurious alike to the country which thus cuts itself of from profitable, and to that whose export trade is so unreasonably curtailed.

Your last report on the subject intimated that favorable action on the part of the Venezuelan legislature might be near at hand. It seems desirable that you should continue to press the matter on the attention of the executive as well, and ask that its influence be used to induce proper legislation in this respect. There is reason to believe that President Guzman Blanco is favorably disposed to obtain relief in this connection. That he should exhibit such a disposition is only natural, in view of the repeated evidences of friendship and esteem which his government has shown toward ours, and which we have had pleasure in manifesting also in return. It may, therefore, aid toward a final disposal of the question if, in addition to your representations to the minister of foreign relations, you were to avail yourself of any friendly opportunity of conversation with President Guzman Blanco to impress him with the strong desire we feel that this unfair discrimination should be done away with.

I am, &c.,

FRED’K T. FRELINGHUYSEN.
[Inclosure in No. 187.]

D. A. de Lima & Co., Lanman & Kemp, and other New York merchants to Mr. Frelinghuysen.

Sir: The undersigned merchants, established in the city of New York, engaged in the shipping and the sale of American goods for and to the West India Islands and the importation into the United States of South American produce, respectfully call your attention to the great detriment brought to their trade by the differential duties of an additional 30 per cent. levied by the Government of Venezuela on goods imported into Venezuela from said islands.

The proximity of Venezuela to the British island of Trinidad, the Danish island of St. Thomas, and the Dutch island of Curaçoa, had made them, after years of careful work, very valuable points of indirect connection between the United States and Venezuela, through the agency of former residents of those islands who subsequently established in the United States.

By the establishment of the differential duties, the direct trade of the United States with those islands and the indirect trade with Venezuela have suffered material detriment.

Of the several sailing vessels that had been actively running between New York and said islands, scarcely any remain in the line, and steamers that formerly used to go every fortnight with full share of cargo for those pores now hardly get enough freight to pay their continuing in the trade.

While the business between New York and those islands is thus decreasing, the direct trade with Venezuela gets no proportionate increase in any but exclusively American products such as flour, lard, kerosene, &c., or such articles as cannot begot from Europe, because the largest number of houses in Venezuela are European firms which, engaged for years in business with European markets, import from there all other goods, such as cotton fabrics, machineries, agricultural implements, tinware, boots and shoes, candles, soaps, lamps, glassware, perfumeries, plated goods, clocks, watches, books, canned meats, preserved fruits, liquors, matches, jewelries, ropes, blocks, oars, and other ship-chandlery articles, straw paper, writing-paper, envelopes, wires, furniture, trunks, sewing-machines, and scores of other articles which it would be too long to enumerate and in which the United States, in competition with Europe, had, of recent years, established very valuable indirect connection with Venezuela through those islands.

In the like manner, the United States used to export to those islands quantities of East Indian and Chinese goods from bonded warehouses here, such as rice, mattings, fire-crackers, cassia, &c., all of which those islands, through their established trade with the United States and the greater facilities to get the same from here than from [Page 543] Europe, used to import constantly from here to send to Venezuela. Said articles are now going from Europe to Venezuela.

Further does the trade of New York suffer from the circumstance that a great portion of the Venezuelan products, which formerly were purchased by merchants of those islands for shipment to New York, are now taken by European houses in Venezuela for shipment to Europe, owing to the lack of traffic between those islands and Venezuela.

It may be well to observe that all those detriments which Venezuela is thus causing to the direct trade between itself and the West India Islands and to the commerce of the United States, in the indirect manner above described, are likely to prove ultimately to the disadvantage of Venezuela, as lines of steamers now running between the United States and West Indian Islands, and touching at Venezuelan ports, and which lines were established in connection with the trade of those islands with Venezuela, are likely to seek employment in some combination of trade with New Grenada.

Knowing the great regard in which the government at Washington is deservedly held by the Government of Venezuela, we take the liberty to request the honorable Secretary of State to use his good offices with Venezuela, in order to annul the decree of differential duties on goods imported from the West Indian Islands into Venezuela.

Respectfully.

(Signed by D. A. de Lima & Co., Lanman & Kemp, Foulke & Co., Bartram Bros., Iowa Barb Wire Company, Eugene Kelly & Co., Schultz, Southwick & Co., H. B. Claflin & Co., McKesson & Robbins, Colgate & Co., H. K. & F. B. Thurber & Co., and thirty-eight other firms.)