value, and cotton goods and textiles of colors similar to those produced in the Philippines paid from fourteen to fifteen per cent., while those of red, green or yellow, not local colors, were admitted free. Only fifteen articles of export are enumerated as paying export duty, but everything, in fact, except gold, silver and tobacco, sent to Spanish ports paid such a duty. Articles not enumerated, if exported under the Spanish flag, paid one per cent.; if under a foreign flag to Spain, two per cent. ; and to foreign ports, three per cent. Silver coin sent under the Spanish flag to a foreign port paid two per cent., and four per cent. if carried under a foreign flag. The export duty on hemp depended on four sets of conditions. If exported (1) in Spanish ships to Spanish ports it paid one per cent., (2) in Spanish ships to a foreign port, one and one-half per cent., (3) in foreign ships to Spanish ports, or (4) in foreign ships to foreign ports, two per cent. Rice under the same conditions was free in the first and second instances, paid two per cent. in the third and four per cent. in the fourth. After 1831 rice exported in foreign ships paid an additional one per cent. for the benefit of the poor in San José. Under this policy Spanish ships carried nearly all the imports and foreign ships nearly all the exports. Thus in 1854 the imports under the Spanish flag amounted to 5,544,844 pesos, and under foreign flags to 210,482 pesos. The exports under the Spanish flag amounted to 213,656 pesos, and under foreign flags to 5,138,691 pesos. Although the rates were occasionally revised and some changes made in classification, the tariff remained substantially in this form until 1891. In 1857 rice and paddy were exempt from the import duty. Before that time no rice of any consequence had been imported. From the time when the importation of rice commenced the quantity of hemp, sugar, tobacco and copra exported commenced to increase steadily. Agricultural machinery, rails, cars and railroad machinery, as well as machinery for certain industries, books and scientific instruments and the like, were placed on the free list. After 1870 the most of the duties were calculated with reference to quantity and not value. The revised tariff of 1891, which was in force at the time of American occupation, was continued until November 15, 1901. Under its provisions all Spanish goods imported under the Spanish flag were admitted free; the island market was carefully protected for the benefit of Spanish goods, the ad valorem duties were entirely abandoned and the free list practically wiped out. Between 1890 and 1896, reviving an old custom, a loading and unloading tax of two per cent. ad valorem based on "official values" was levied on vessels frequenting Manila Harbor. In 1896 a consumption tax at specific rates was levied on spirituous liquors, beer and cider, salt, vegetables, flour and mineral oils. In 1897 six per cent. additional was levied as a war tax. In 1880 the Board of Harbor Improvement was established at Manila, with authority to collect additional duties equal to twenty per cent. of the regular duties. At first this tax was collected by the board and was levied even on Spanish goods which were exempt from the specific duties of the general tariff. As goods from other ports of the Philippines did not pay this tax, the way was open for fraud, and it became necessary to reduce the rate to ten per cent. and collect it at all ports. Collections were thereafter made by the regular customs officials. Wharf and harbor dues in later years amounted to one and one-half peso per ton of one thousand kilos (2,500 pounds) on all exports and one-half peso per ton on imports intended for transshipment to other parts of the islands. There was also a charge of 0.10 pesos per net ton for lighthouse dues, and the stamps which had to be purchased and used in connection with a ship's papers cost about four pesos. From 1528 until 1874 there was a peculiar charge on commerce which was known as the average. It came from the days when merchant ships had to be convoyed and was supposed to reimburse the government for special protection rendered commerce by the navy, judicial and lighthouse service. To illustrate the way in which the additional taxes modified the original specific duties, Professor Plehn takes the case of an importation of one hundred kilos of salt." The following charges would have to be paid: (1) Specific duty 0.650 (2) Surtax for Manila Harbor, ten per cent. of the above duty 0.065 (3) Six per cent. plus two per cent ad valorem (on official value of 0.40 peso) 0.032 (4) Consumption tax 1.000 Total 1.747 ... As was but natural, this method caused much friction, as the shipping people inevitably thought in terms of the specific tax and were greatly irritated by the extras which they regarded as impositions. A considerable part of the income of the government was derived from various forms of trade monopolies. The sale of stamped paper brought a large revenue. Adhesive stamps were required to be used on insurance policies, drafts and bank checks, and such like instruments. Postage and telegraph stamps were handled in the same general way. The stamped paper was in various forms and was sold at different prices, but the kind that should be used in each business transaction was carefully determined by law. In order to avoid the handling of money by employees it was provided that a person who was required to pay a fine imposed by a court must purchase certain stamped paper, a package of which was cut through, one part, upon which proper memoranda was made, being retained by the official and the other part by the payer as his receipt. Considerable revenue was derived from the sale of papal bulls and indulgences, which, like tithes, was one of the revenues that passed to the Crown under the arrangement by which it assumed the obligation to support the churches. The exclusive right to sell opium, which was farmed out, in Pol. Sci. Quar. XVII, p. 134. 1849 yielded five hundred thousand pesos per annum.8 Cockpits were also sources of government revenue. A royal order of March 21, 1861, provided for the regulation of this popular amusement. The privilege to operate cockpits was sold to the highest bidder and yielded the government from one hundred thousand pesos to two hundred thousand pesos per year. In 1891 this source of revenue was relinquished to the local governments. Lotteries were encouraged and from 1850 to the American occupation they brought in about eight hundred thousand pesos per year. Three-fourths of the receipts were distributed in prizes, and all unsold tickets were "played" by the treasury. From 1850 to 1882 the general government levied a tax of ten per cent. on the fees received by municipal governments for licenses for markets, fisheries, ferries, fords, slaughter-houses, public carts and carriages, weights and measures, and the rents received from public property, a tax on the taxes. Considerable revenue was derived from the sale of forestry products and lesser amounts from the sales of public lands and commutations, or payments by squatters for the right to locate temporarily on public lands. The carefully guarded mining privileges never brought the government a very great amount of revenue. For many years the government derived a substantial revenue from the profits of the trade and commerce in which it engaged as a trader or farmed out. The trade in quicksilver, salt, playing cards and, in later times, spirituous liquors, explosives, opium and tobacco, was reserved to the government and the profits were large. The tribute which was paid in kind by the people, was exchanged at the royal stores in Manila for Chinese, Indian or Persian goods which were exported to Mexico in the galleons on government account. Prior to the opening of the nineteenth century all business not conducted by the royal stores was in the hands of a close corporation of Manila merchants, the Consulado, 8 The contractor paid a tax of 40 pesos per chest in addition to the regular customs duties. afterward the Compañia Guipuzcoana de Caracas. The export trade, which was confined to the galleons, paid little revenue at the custom house. Of course all this has changed when the trade with Europe and the Asiatic coast was legalized and the port of Manila opened to foreign traders. The raising, manufacture and sale of tobacco was assumed by the government in 1871 and continued until 1884. It was the most important of all the government monopolies, and in it were manifested all the worst evils of such a system. At first confined to the district of Gapon, in Nueva Ecija, certain districts in the Cagayan Valley and the island of Martinique, it was in time extended to La Isabela, La Union, Ibra, Ilocus Sur and Ilocus Norte. In the Visayans the people were at liberty to raise tobacco or sell to whom they pleased, but the government established collecting centers where the product could be classified and stored. From 1842 the Igorots were allowed to cultivate tobacco, and in 1853 they produced twenty-five thousand bales. For many years this trade in tobacco furnished one of the principal items in the budget, but it ended like all government trade monopolies in the oppression of the people and in financial loss. The monopoly involved the restriction of cultivation to certain districts, certainty in the amount to be raised, compulsory labor, the prevention of contraband production and sales, the purchase of the entire crop by the government at a price fixed by the purchaser, inspection of the growing crop and of the product, its classification, its transportation under government supervision, the manufacture in government factories, the prohibition of the export of any tobacco product except by the government, and the collection and purchase of as much as possible of the crop raised in districts not under the control of the monopoly.10 The natives were encouraged and assisted to settle in the selected districts, and for a while were well treated. To induce them to leave their old habitations, a very serious matter for a 9 In 1834. From 1785 to 1830 the trade other than between Manila and Acapulco was controlled by the Real Compañia de la Filipinas. 10 C. C. Plehn, Pol. Sci. Quar., XVII, p. 142. |
