System of levying duties.
Previously to 1802, if the duties were not paid on
the arrival of the goods at the port of discharge, their
owners or consignees were required to enter into
bonds with the Customs to provide security for the
amount due to the Crown. "It was often," remarks
McCulloch,[1] "very difficult to find sureties, and the
merchant, in order to raise funds to pay the duty,
was frequently reduced to the ruinous necessity of
selling his goods immediately on their arrival, when
perhaps the market was already glutted. Neither
was this the only inconvenience that grew out of
this system, for the duties having to be paid all at
once, and not by degrees as the goods were sold for
consumption, their price was raised by the amount of
the profit on the capital advanced in payment of the
duties; competition, too, was diminished in consequence
of the greater command of funds required
to carry on trade under such disadvantages, and
a few rich individuals were enabled to monopolize
the importation of those commodities on which heavy
duties were payable. The system had besides an
obvious tendency to discourage the carrying trade.
It prevented this country from becoming the entrepôt
for foreign products by hindering the importation of
such as were not immediately wanted for home consumption,
and thus tended to lessen the resort of
foreigners to our markets, inasmuch as it rendered it
difficult, or rather impossible, for them to complete an
assorted cargo. And in addition to all these circumstances,
the difficulty of granting a really equivalent
drawback to the exporters of such commodities as had
- ↑ 'Commercial Dictionary,' p. 1504.
