French sugar and a colonial foreign policy

The Molasses Act sought to make trade with French Caribbean colonies more difficult for mainland merchants. Those merchants followed lower prices and their own local interests, choices that amounted to an increasingly independent foreign policy. Purchases enriched French colonies belonging to a recurring British opponent instead of integrating the mainland settlements into Britain's imperial economy. British policymakers also wanted to preserve Jamaica and other sugar colonies that produced much more tax revenue. Each side had an intelligible economic case, and each combined self-interest with a larger strategic consequence.