359 The fact that the komrnerskollcgium receded into the background during the reign of Charles XI was related to the king’s effort to establish the indelningsverket, or allotment system, as the fiscal base for the state apparatus.'* The military was supported by means of allotted homesteads and revenues in kind, thus somewhat reducing the need for cash with which to finance the operations of the state. The fiscal policy introduced by Gustav II Adolf and Axel Oxenstierna, that is, the policy of meeting all state expenditures with cash revenues produced by indirect taxes, was thus abandoned, thereby altering the position of the kommerskollegium. The kommerskollegium was reestablished as an independent administrative organ in 1711. It was charged once again with the tasks it had performed before being absorbed by the kammarkollegium in the 1680s, and it was once again given the responsibility of acting as the superior court in cases of maritime law.'- The reestablishment of the kommerskollegium occurred at a time when monetary policy and the cash economy were resorted to in order to solve the difficult fiscal problems resulting from the Great Northern War. The old revenues proved insufficient for meeting the rapidly rising military expenditures, while at the same time Sweden lost important revenues with the loss of her Baltic and German provinces. In addition, the allotment system, which was intended for peacetime conditions, may have been viewed as an obstacle to a successful transition to a wartime economy. Against this background, then, crown finances were once again to be based largely on revenues in the form of cash. This fiscal policy was to be based on revenues from exports, which were therefore placed under state control.'^ The kommerskollegium was thus charged with important administrative functions. In Russia, an attempt was made to establish a “college for commercial affairs” in 1712.'^ These efforts did not, however, produce any lasting results, and it was only in connection with Peter the Great’s collegial reforms that a unitary administrative organ for Russia’s trade and commerce emerged. That college, the organization of which began at St. Petersburg in 1718, was charged with responsibilities which in the main corresponded to those of the Swedish kommerskollegium. In the ukaz presenting the guidelines for the reform of the central administration, an ukaz which the tsar wrote out in his own hand, the activities of this college were described in the following manner: ” See above, p. 193. Johan Axel Almquist, Kommerskollegium och Riksens Ständers manufakturkontor samt konsulsstaten (Stockholm, 1912—1915), 58. *•’ Gösta Lindeberg, Svensk ekonomisk politik under den görtzska perioden (Lund, 1941), 3—5. ZA (no. 247), 205. ‘5 ZA (no. 263), 218.
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