15. The Danish West Indies. [Waldemar Westergaard, The Danish West Indies, N. Y., 1917.]
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The narrative history of the minor states is well treated in Seignobos; present conditions are described in volumes of the series Our European Neighbors, N. Y., Putnam.
On Belgium, see Belgium, its institutions, industries, and commerce, Brussels, 1904, a handbook published by the government for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Similar handbooks have been published for the Scandinavian peninsula; they include much historical material and are valuable sources for our purposes. See Norway, edited by Sten Konow and Karl Fischer, Kristiania, 1900; Sweden, its people and its industry, edited by Gustav Sundbärg, Stockholm, 1904. Drachmann, Industrial development and commercial policies of the three Scandinavian countries, published for the Carnegie Peace Endowment in 1915, is the best survey of commercial development, but is not an easy book for the elementary student to use. Kiaer has published a valuable historical sketch of the development of Scandinavian shipping in Journal of Polit. Econ., 1891-2, 1: 329-364.
On Switzerland see The Swiss Confederation, by Francis O. Adams and C. D. Cunningham, London, 1889, and W. H. Dawson, Social Switzerland, London, 1897. On Austria-Hungary see S. Whitman, The realm of the Habsburgs, N. Y., Lovell 1893, and the volume by F. H. E. Palmer in the series of Our European Neighbors, N. Y., Putnam.
CHAPTER XLIII
STATES OF SOUTHERN EUROPE
529. Condition of Italy in the first half of the century.—Of the countries of southern Europe none has gained so rapidly as Italy in the latter part of the nineteenth century. The explanation, however, must be sought largely in the fact that none was sunk so low as Italy in the first part of the century. Conditions of an earlier period, described in the previous chapter on Italy, lasted far into recent times. Here is the description given by an English author, writing in 1878: “Before 1848, Italy, all except Piedmont, seemed hopelessly crushed. Austria, the Pope, and the Bourbons held her in their grasp. Even the comparatively native sovereigns of Tuscany had turned oppressor, and all Italy groaned like a man in the grasp of the torturer. Commerce languished, divergent fiscal laws and arbitrary raids on private wealth choked up the channels of intercourse between one part of the kingdom and another; without shipping, without manufactures or foreign trade of a solid kind, possessed of no political security, Italy was, thirty years ago, more insignificant in the eyes of neighboring nations than Greece or Spain is now.” In southern Italy the government was incompetent to perform the first of its public duties, the protection of its citizens. It could not withstand even the half-civilized corsairs of Tripoli, who pillaged the Neapolitan ships, and finally, long after the United States had shown the proper way to deal with such pirates, bought from them a disgraceful peace.
530. Lack of political and commercial union.—The peninsula was divided among seven independent states, so stratified as to cut the natural lines of trade, and to prevent effectually the development of any national commercial life. Of these states six had the protective tariffs characteristic of the prohibitive period, and toll stations existed even inside the frontiers. A Milan manufacturer, shipping silks to Florence (about 1840), had to pass eight customs stations in 150 miles; a merchant on his way from Bologna to Lucca was stopped at seven stations in the stretch of about 125 miles. Commerce would have been in desperate straits except that all but two of the states touched the sea, and hence could find some opening for trade. It is noteworthy, however, that the leading commercial city of Italy in this period was one which many people now would be puzzled to place on the map, Leghorn. It owed its commercial importance, not to the advantages of situation or to the productive resources of surrounding territory; it stood, about 1900, sixth in the list of Italian ports, and had but a fraction of the trade going to Naples or Genoa. It gained its prosperity at this time simply by “the comparative security and freedom” which foreigners found there, and which they were denied in other parts of Italy.
531. Establishment of Italian unity.—The example of Germany, in extricating herself from a somewhat similar situation by the formation of customs unions, made, naturally, an impression in Italy, and led in 1847 to an attempt there to form a similar union. The attempt was paralyzed by the opposition of Austria, who saw in it a blow aimed at her political influence in the peninsula. The Italian states, unlike the German, could secure commercial union only as a result of national unity, not as a means of preparation for it. National unity was in preparation, nevertheless, in the brain of a great statesman, Cavour, and was obtained through his far-sighted plans and the cooperation of the king whom he served, Victor Emanuel, ruler of Piedmont. In the few years following 1859 a real kingdom of Italy was established, and the country, which for nearly fifteen hundred years had formed the prey of rival powers, became at last a power herself, worthy to rank with the other great states of Europe. The old barriers to internal trade disappeared, and the whole country accepted the customs tariff of Piedmont, which was extremely liberal. Rarely, if ever, in the history of commerce, have changes of such sweeping importance taken place so quickly. The tariff of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, to choose an extreme example, which levied a duty of over $2,500 on a centner of silk goods, gave place to a tariff of United Italy, in which the corresponding duty reached a minimum of $10.
532. Survey of Italian commerce since 1860.—The effect on commerce of this great political upheaval was instantaneous. Contrasting the two years, 1859 and 1861, we find that in this brief interval the value of imports into Italy more than doubled. It will be convenient to insert here figures giving the total value (exports plus imports) of the special trade of Italy, at ten year intervals from 1860 to 1910. Reduced to dollars and given in round figures of millions they are as follows: 130, 320, 440, 440, 590, 1,020. The reader will note that trade grew at a rapid rate from 1860 to 1870, and more slowly to 1880. Then came a stoppage; in some years there was an actual decline, and the value of exports was considerably less at the end of the decade than at its beginning. There was a recovery in the ten years closing in 1900, and a rapid advance thereafter. The figures show, however, that Italian commerce advanced but slowly in the latter part of the century, and a study of conditions at its close would show that Italy had a commerce then far from commensurate with the country’s large population. The average share of each Italian in the annual movement of commerce was much less than that falling to the inhabitants of most of the other states of Europe. Among the great states only Spain and Russia ranked lower, in this respect.