The Consulado in Santa Fe de Bogotá1
ONE ARTICLE OF THE Reglamento de comercio libre of 1778 (which, incidentally, has nothing to do with free trade as economists understand the term), provided for the erection of consulados in the Spanish ports newly opened (habititados) to trade with America.2 The crown's failure to extend the same privilege to the colonies aroused merchants to petition for permission to organize the consulado in Buenos Aires, Havana, Caracas, Cartagena, and other commercial centers. In granting charters to these new institutions the king said he was influenced by the fact that the consulados of Mexico and Lima were inadequate to serve the needs of a growing trade. The inference that until the 1790's these were the only consulados in America is incorrect, if one takes into account the brief, and admittedly, unimpressive history of the Consulado of Santa Fe de Bogota. In the 1660's the Council of the Indies and the Consulado of Sevilla worked out a new plan for financing the armadas which convoyed the merchant fleets across the Atlantic. A dotacin fija of 790,000 ducats was divided unequally between the Real Hacienda and the mercantile groups of Spain and America. New Granada's quota was 40,000 pesos, of which Santa Fe was to pay 20,000 pesos; Cartagena, 12,000 pesos; and Popayan, 8,000 pesos.3 Under Treasury administration the averia-the tax levy to raise the assigned quotas-yielded only 10-12,000 pesos in New Granada. Even so, Santa Fe merchants complained that they paid more than