104      FOREIGN  RIGHTS  AND  INTERESTS  IN  CHINA

to  be  noted  tliat  it  was  understood  that  the  customs  duties
thus  fixed  should  not  be  increased  beyond  the  amounts
then  agreed  upon.  This  principle  was  continued  in  later
treaties,  and  thus,  improvidently — for  the  Chinese  Gov-
ernment did  not  then  see  the  seriousness  of  the  step  nor
obtain  any  real  quid  pro  quo  for  the  engagement  upon
her  part — ^China  has  since  been  unable  to  exercise  the
right  of  determining  the  rates  of  her  own  export  and
import  dues.  In  this  respect  China  is  unique  among  the
great  Powers  of  the  world.^  It  is  true  that  the  Western
Powers  have  been  accustomed  to  enter  into  special  com-
mercial treaties  regulating  trade  between  the  contracting
parties,  but  in  few,  if  any,  cases  have  these  treaties  fixed
the  absolute  rates  that  might  be  charged  upon  all  exports
or  imports.  Their  purpose  has  been  to  grant  certain
reciprocal  privileges  as  regards  maximum  and  minimum
rates  in  general,  or  to  determine  the  conditions  under
which  specific  articles  may  be  exported  or  imported.  The
fiscal  limitations  under  which  China  has  suffered  since
1842  have  thus  differed  from  those  created  by  commercial
treaties  between  the  Western  Powers  in  the  two  impor-
tant respects  that,  first,  they  have  fixed  a  very  low  rate
which  has  applied  to  all  articles  of  export  or  import,^  and
second,  these  limitations  having  been  granted  to  all  the
Treaty  Powers,  China  finds  herself  in  the  situation  that
she  cannot  get  rid  of  them  or  lessen  their  severity  unless
she  can  obtain  the  unanimous  consent  of  all  these  Treaty
Powers,  and  this,  up  to  the  present  time,  she  has  been

*  Japan  long  suflFered  under  the  same  treaty  restriction.  She,  in  turn,
imposed  the  same  restriction  upon  Korea.  Siam  is  still  subject  to  similar
restrictions,  as  is  also  Turkey  in  a  measure.
