Dissertation_A Bick_May 25 - DataSpace at Princeton University

directly from New Netherland, and shortly thereafter he was appointed Director General for both
colonies, a position he would keep until surrendering to English forces in 1664. 161 Since New
Netherland had for several years already been controlled by the Amsterdam chamber of the WIC,
this arrangement would place Curaçao under Amsterdam’s control as well. It must have been
easy enough for Amsterdam merchants to see what profits might be gained from a free and open
trade not only to Brazil, but to new markets in the Caribbean and Spanish America as well.
6. Conclusion
In many ways the debate over free trade to Angola mirrored the earlier debate over free trade to
Brazil. In both cases merchants in Amsterdam were the prime instigators for lifting the
company’s monopoly, while merchants and city officials in Zeeland were their most ardent and
vocal opponents. In both cases the free traders argued for the advantages of commercial liberty
and portrayed themselves as possessing greater competence in matters of trade: in the context of
Brazil this meant the ability to carry more sugar; in Angola more slaves. Defenders of the
company’s monopoly, meanwhile, argued that the company should be able to enjoy some of the
profits that flowed from its military and administrative undertakings and associated risks, and
that the company’s ability to control prices and maintain order were crucial to the proper
management of the colonies.
But these similarities hide an important underlying shift. This chapter has argued that
the States General’s decision to re-impose the company's monopoly on trade to Brazil in
December 1636 was stimulated by investors’ refusal to commit additional private capital to the
WIC without assurance that the company would have access to steady income from Brazil, and
161 Jacobs, Petrus Stuyvesant, 45–48.
218