But the first condition of that was the creation of a home market by the removal of the innumerable customs lines and varieties of fiscal legislation formed by the small German states, in other words, the formation of a German-Customs Union or Zollverein. That could only be done on the basis of a liberal tariff, calculated rather to raise a common revenue than to protect home production. On no other condition could the small states have been induced to join. Thus the new German tariff, though slightly protective to some trades, was, at the time of its introduction, a model of Free Trade legislation; and it remained so, although, ever since 1830, the majority of German manufacturers kept clamoring for protection. Yet, under this extremely liberal tariff, and in spite of German domestic industries based on hand-labor being mercilessly crushed out by the competition of English factories worked by steam, the transition from manual labor to machinery was gradually accomplished in Germany too, and is now nearly complete; the transformation of Germany from an agricultural to a manufacturing country went on at the same pace, and was, since 1866, assisted by favorable political events: the establishment of a strong central government, and federal legislature, ensuring uniformity in the laws regulating trade, as well as in currency, weights and measures, and, finally, the flood of the French milliards. Thus, about 1874, German trade on the market of the world ranked next to that of Great Britain,[1] and Germany employed more steam power in manufactures and locomotion than any European Continental country. The proof has thus been furnished that even nowadays, in spite of the enormous
- ↑ General Trade of Exports and Imports added in 1874, in millions of dollars; Great Britain—8300; Germany—2325; France—1665; United States—1245 millions of dollars. (Kolb, Statistik, 7th edit. Leipsic: 1875; p. 790.)
