File No. 836/66.
Chargé Lorillard to the Secretary of State.
Petropolis, February 15, 1907.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the department’s instruction No. 37, of January 5, 1907, which, after acknowledging the receipt of Mr. Griscom’s telegram of the 2d of that month, relative to the authorization of the Brazilian Congress to continue our 20 per cent preferential tariff reduction, assumes that there will be no break in the continued enjoyment by American products of the old preferential reductions. At the same time the department calls attention to the delays which have previously occurred in decreeing the authorization of Congress.
In reply I have the honor to refer you to my Nos. 96 and 102, of January 14 and 30, 1907, respectively, in which you were informed that owing to the representations of the embassy the President of Brazil, on January 10 last, decreed the continuance of our old preferential tariff reduction for the whole year 1907, and that the surplus duties collected on American flour at Pernambuco since January 1, 1907, and before the date of said decree, were ordered to be returned, thus continuing the preferential reduction without break.
The articles which enjoy the preferential are the ones mentioned on page 8 of Daily Consular and Trade Report No. 2614, of July 14, 1906, with the addition that paints are included under varnishes, as the department was informed by Mr. Griscom’s No. 15, of August 17, 1906, and that linotypes and cash-register machines have been included under the classification of typewriters.
I have, etc.,