A number of means have been devised to facilitate the care and handling of goods. Goods to be imported pay duty on the spot; or the importer may have a running account against a deposit made by him in the form of government bonds. Provision is also made so that goods may be shipped with a customs certificate to the inland consignee, who pays the duty on delivery. Similar procedure is provided for goods forwarded in transit through Germany to other countries.
By reason of the free port, as well as the industrial development of Germany, Hamburg has become the second seaport in the world. It does more business than London, or Liverpool, and is a close second to New York. The total foreign commerce of the port is just short of $2,000,000,000. It exceeds that of London by $100,000,000 and far exceeds Liverpool in imports.
Students of the commercial ascendency of Germany are in substantial harmony as to the great value of the free port as an agency in the country's development. Mr. Edwin J. Clapp in his treatise on the Free Port of Hamburg says:
The first advantage of the free port is in facilitating re-exportation; indeed the importance of the re-exportation trade is large and, above all else, led to its creation. In the free port foreign merchants can maintain sample or consignment stocks. Bonded warehouses do not offer the same opportunity for unhindered movement of merchandise within a port. Everything must be done under the control of customs men. In Hamburg there is no need of counting and verifying pieces when a re-exportation is made. A bonded warehouse can not offer the same facilities for various manipulations necessary to prepare the goods for the consumer, such as cutting wines and mixing coffees.
Perhaps, the chief advantage of the free port lies in the facilities it offers for the rapid frictionless discharge of ships with dutiable goods, whether destined for re-exportation or shipment inland.
The free port of Hamburg lets the Hamburg merchants store their goods duty free, and offers them complete freedom of manipulation for re-exporting them or for sending them inland, as the market dictates.Many other advantages in addition to the re-establishment of American shipping and an American merchant marine will follow from the opening of free ports. Among these advantages are the following:
1. It will link the United States with South America, Asia and Africa by trade connections which will tend to the promotion of friendly relations to the commercial advantage of each and will supply an easier outlet for American goods, which now have to go in bulk to England or Germany for transshipment to other countries, or do not find an outlet at all.
2. A second gain lies in the bringing of great quantities of goods to our shores for importation or export, as trade needs demand. To these ports American manufacturers or buyers in need of foreign supplies can go and secure them at American ports rather than in foreign countries. In these ports merchants can exhibit samples; they can mix, grade and alter commodities for domestic or export use; and can
