The commission revised the customs charter and offered such tax relief for Riga, Revel and Narva, which the Russian experts found unprofitable for the treasury.
According to the project of the hot mercantilist Johann Ludwig Luberas von Pott, the Commerce Collegium was to become the head of a network of Russian commercial agents in the main centers of world trade: these agents were obliged to inform the Collegium of Commerce of all the information needed for the Russian merchants.
On the other hand, the Collegium of Commercee was to enter into close contact with the manufactory college and, together with it, regulate the direction of Russian industry, which constitutes the "life of trade".
With the closure, after Peter's ruling, the main magistrate, manufactories and berg colleges, their affairs were also joined to the department of the Collegium of Commerce (1731).
With the arrangement of the provincial institutions of Empress Catherine II, the very existence of the Collegium of Commerce was questioned, since all its affairs were to be distributed between the state chambers and other public places of the provinces.
The notes of Gretsch contain a semi-fantastic story about the birth of this curious Pavlovian law: Once, while the court was in Gatchina, the prosecutor general (P.X.
- There is, sir, some pile of books in the attic, remaining even after His Excellency Prince Grigory Grigorievich Orlov.
- Lead me there, Speransky said, he found some old French books in the attic, and on the rest of the day and the next night he wrote "Commercial Charter of the Russian Empire".
- Gretsch, 85-88[6]But almost in 1801 it was recognized that the presence of deputies in the Collegium of Commerce "was not only unsuccessful for the trade improving, but for the merchants themselves, so distracted from crafts and deals, and so influence it ruinously."
By a decree of March 31, 1764, the meetings were established instead of them, "in order to keep up with things", a special duty of which was made the discussion of "all projects related to the spread of commerce, and the compilation of new regulations".