Powers shall signify to the other its intenion of limiting the duration of the treaty. At the expiration of such twelve months after the reception of such notice, the treaty is to cease to be of effect. "14. The treaty is to be rati fied, and the ratifications exchanged within one month, or sooner if possible. Done at Vienna July 3, 1838. " METTERNICH. "FREDERIC JAMES LAMB." PRUSSIAN COMMERCIAL UNION TREATY. RETURN TO AN ADDRESS OF THE HON. THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, DATED MAY 8, 1838; for A Copy of the Prussian Commercial Union Treaty; and return of the names of the several states which have joined that union, and the dates at which they so joined; and also the names of the several states in Germany which have not agreed to join that union; together with a return of the population of each of those states respectively, from the latest census. No. 1. Treaty of Customs' Union between Prussia, Hesse-Cassel, and Hesse-Darmstadt, and Bavaria and Wurtemberg. Signed at Berlin, March 22, 1833. With additional articles, signed at Berlin, October 31, 1833. [Extracted from the collection of laws for the states of the kingdom of Prussia, 1833. No. 21. Published December 5, 1833. Art. I. The customs' associations at present existing between the before-mentioned states, shall, for the future, form one confederation, united by a common system of trade and customs, and comprehending all the countries included therein. II. Into this united confederation shall especially be admitted such states as have already ac ceded, either with their whole ter❤ ritory, or with a part of it, to the system of trade and customs of one or other of the contracting states; and regard shall be had to their peculiar relations, arising out of their treaties of accession, with reference to those states, with which such treaties have been concluded. III. But those distinct parts of the territory of the contracting states, which have not yet, on account of their situation, been found suitable for admission into the Prussian and Hessian, or into the Bavarian and Wurtembergian customs' association, and are for the same reason unsuited for reception into the new united confederation, shall continue to be provisionally excluded from it. Those regulations shall, however, be maintained, which are at present in force, relative to the facilities of commercial communication between those parts and the principal territory. Further concessions of this nature shall be granted only by the common consent of the contracting states. IV. Similar laws, relative to import, export, and transit duties, shall prevail within the dominions of the contracting states, but with to the administration of the customs. such modifications as may, without infringing upon the general rule, be necessary, in consequence of the VI. Freedom of trade and compeculiarity of the general legisla merce between the contracting tion of any of the contracting states, and a common interest in states, or of local interests. For the customs revenues, as settled in instance, in the customs' tariff, by the following articles, shall comregulating the import and export mence with the operation of the duties upon particular articles, present treaty. which are ill-suited for the wholesale trade; and in the transit duties, when the course of the commercial roads may render it necessary, by making such variations from the usual rates of duties, as may appear desirable for particular states; provided that their operation be not injurious to the general interests. The administration of the import, export, and transit duties, and the organization of the authorities for that purpose, shall, in like manner, be put upon the same footing in all the countries of the united confederation, regard being had to the peculiar circumstances existing in each. The laws and ordinances to be prepared in furtherance of these views, and to be agreed upon by the contracting states; viz.: The customs' law, the customs' tariff, and the customs' regulation, shall be considered as integral and essential parts of the present treaty, and be published simultaneously with it. V. Alterations in the customs' laws, generally, including the customs' tariff and the customs' regulation (Article IV.), and also additions to, and exceptions from them, shall be effected only in the same manner as the laws are introduced, and with the approbation of all the contracting states; which arrangement shall likewise apply to every regulation involving a general change in the rules relative VII. And from the same period, also, all import, export, and transit duties, shall be discontinued on the common boundaries of the late Prussian and Hessian, and Bavarian and Wurtembergian associations, and all articles which are already allowed to be freely interchanged in the territory of the one, shall be freely and without restriction admitted into the territory of the other, with the following reserved exceptions; a. Articles belonging to monopolies of the state (playingcards and salt) according to articles IX. and X. b. Domestic productions, upon which duties of various amounts are at present levied within the contracting states, or which are exempt from duty in one state, but subject to duty in another, and are on this account liable to a compensation duty, according to article XI.; and lastly, c. Such articles as cannot be imitated or introduced without infringing on the privileges or patents of invention conceded by one of the contracting states, and are therefore to be still excluded, during the continuance of the patents or privileges, from importation into that state which has granted them. VIII. The transport of those articles of trade upon which is levied, according to the common customs' tariff, an import or export duty, at the extreme bounda ries, and also when removed out of the Royal Bavarian and Royal Wurtembergian countries, into the Royal Prussian, Electoral Hessian, and Grand-ducal Hessian countries, and vice versa, shall, without prejudice to the freedom of commerce and the exemption from duty settled in article VII., take place only upon the usual highways and military roads, and upon the navigable streams; and there shall be established, at the intermediate boundaries, common station houses, where the conductors of goods shall present their bills of lading, or tickets of transport, and specify the articles about to be exported from the one territory to the other. This regulation shall not apply to the traffic in raw products in small quantities, nor in any case to the retail trade on the frontiers, and at the markets, nor to the luggage of travellers; nor shall a revision of goods take place, unless it be necessary to secure the compensation duties. (Article VII. b.) IX. With respect to the importation of playing-cards, each state belonging to the Union shall be at liberty to retain the existing laws of prohibition or restriction. X. With respect to salt, the following rules shall be observed : a. The importation of salt, and of all articles from which culinary salt is generally extracted, into the states of the Union, from foreign countries not belonging to the Union, shall be forbidden, unless it be actually on account of one of the united Governments, and for direct sale in their salt offices, factories, or dépôts. b. The transit of salt, and of the above-mentioned articles, from countries not belonging to the Union into other countries similarly situate, shall take place only with the consent of the confede rated states whose territories shall be passed, and under such measures of precaution as they may consider it necessary to enforce. c. The exportation of salt into foreign countries, not belonging to the Union, shall be free. d. With respect to the trade in salt within the states of the Union, the importation of that article out of one state into another, shall be allowed only when there exist special treaties to that effect between the Governments of those states. e. If one of the Governments of the Union should desire supplies of salt from another, out of either the public or private salt works, they shall be accompanied by passes from the public authorities; and the contracting Governments shall engage point, for this purpose, a public officer at each private salt work, who shall take an account generally of the production and sale thereat. to ap f. If a state of the Union should be desirous of being supplied with its necessary quantity of salt from a foreign country, or from another state of the Union through a third confederated state, or of transporting its salt, through the same channel, into a foreign country not belonging to the Union, no impediment shall be offered thereto; but regulations shall be adopted, after previous agreement with the contracting states, (if such should not have been already established by means of treaties,) as to the transit roads, and the necessary measures taken to ensure the pre vention of smuggling. g. If in any states of the union immediately adjoining others, there should be such a difference in the price of salt that the danger of smuggling would probably arise in one or other of those states, that state, in which the lower price prevails, shall limit the supply of salt to places on the frontiers within a circle of at least six miles inwards, to the quantity absolutely necessary for those places, and shall give a satisfactory explanation and assurance thereupon to the neighbouring states concerned. Further stipulations shall be reserved for special agreement be tween the contracting states. XI. With reference to those productions, the internal duties upon which, according to the legal regulations, vary in the different countries of the union, (Article VII. b.) it is agreed by all parties that it is desirable that uniformity, both in the legislation upon the subject and in the rates of duties, should be established within their states, and that they shall there fore exert themselves to accomplish this object; but in order to avoid the disadvantages which will, until they succeed, result, from unequal taxation, to the producers in one state in relation to the producers in other states of the union, supplementary or com pensation duties shall be raised upon the following articles, viz.:a. Beer, brandy, tobacco, grape juice, and wine, in the kingdom of Prussia; b. Beer, brandy, and bruised malt, in the kingdom of Bavaria, (exclusive, at present, of the Rhine Circle); c. Beer, brandy, and bruised malt, in the kingdom of Wurtemberg; d. Beer, brandy, tobacco, grape juice, and wine, in the electorate of Hesse; and, e. Beer, in the grand duchy of Hesse. The following principles shall be observed in fixing and levying the said duties: 1. The compensation duties shall, after the renunciation of the legal tax upon the goods in the country of their destination, accord with the tax upon the same goods in the country of their origin; and they will, therefore, be alto gether inoperative with reference to those countries of the union where an equally high, or a higher duty, is levied upon the same production. 2. Alterations which are made in the duties upon the domestic productions of the contracting states shall be followed by alterations in the compensation duties, but constantly under the applica tion of the principle established in s. 1. When, by reason of such an alteration, a compensation duty is to be increased, a negotiation thereupon shall, previously, if the increase be absolutely claimed, take place between the contracting states, and a complete statement in support of its admissibility, according to the stipulations of the present treaty, be afforded. 3. The rates of duties upon indigenous grape juice and wine, upon cultivated tobacco, and upon brandy, at present legally existing in Prussia, and the duty upon indigenous bruised malt and beer (Malzanfschlag), at present existing in Bavaria, shall in every case form, in a state of the union which has already introduced or may in future introduce, those duties, the highest rates to be levied, as compensation duties, upon those articles, when imported from a country in which there is no duty upon similar productions, even when the duty in question, if levied in the state which receives the compensation duty, would exceed the highest rate fixed. 4. The internal duties paid to the state shall not be returned, when the articles, upon which the duties have been so paid, are transported into another country of the union. 5. A compensation duty shall not, under any circumstances, be levied upon other articles than beer and malt, brandy, tobacco leaves, grape juice, and wine. 6. In all the states in which a compensation duty is imposed upon tobacco, grape juice, and wine, a further duty upon those articles shall, in no case, be retained or imposed, either on account of the state, or for the benefit of the com munes. 7. Such articles shall not be liable to the compensation duties as are proved, in the manner prescribed in the customs' regulation, to have already, as foreign goods intended for importation or transit, been subjected to the official authority of the proper customs' officers, or to be still liable thereto; nor, in like manner also, those articles produced within the territory of the Union which pass through one confederated State in order to be introduced either into another, or into a foreign country. 8. The compensation duty shall belong to the treasury of that State into which the consignment is sent, and if it should not have been previously levied in the country from which the goods were exported, on account of the State entitled thereto, it shall be paid in the territory of the latter. 9. In each of the contracting States, certain arrangements shall he adopted for levying the compensation duty within that country of the Union from which the consignment is made, either upon the spot, or at the nearest toll or taxoffice; or the payment thereof shall be secured by affording the proper notification. 10. Until such arrangements shall have been adopted by special agreement, the commerce in articles subject to a compensation duty will be in some degree restricted, inasmuch as they must, without distinction as to the quantities transported, be introduced into the territory of the State entitled to the duty, only upon the roads stated in Article VIII., or elsewhere to be defined, and must be reported as the proper stations to be established there, and the duties paid upon them respectively; but the commerce in articles upon which a compensation duty is not to be levied, shall not, however, in consequence of the above regulations, be exposed to any further supervi sion than that declared in the before-mentioned article. XII. With respect to the duties upon articles of consumption which are levied within the countries of the union, upon other articles than those mentioned in Article XI., and with respect also to the duties upon beverages levied in the grand duchy of Hesse, the same treatment shall be reciprocally observed, so that in one State of the Union the productions of another State of the Union shall not, under any pretence, be more heavily taxed than its own indigenous productions. The same principle shall also apply to the excise and other |