Nothing could have been more discouraging than the political and economic state of the country when it emerged from the last civil war. The separation of Panama was to reproach the consciences of a whole generation. Once the links between the interior and the ports had been reopened, accumulated stocks proved so high that freight rates shot upwards. The coffee-growers, now the leading exporters, could not wait for better days, as they had to export to pay their debts. They seemed to understand that good prices had disappeared with the previous century. The government looked for pacts and compromises, between parties, between factions, between principles. The tariffs of 1903 and 1905 followed the protectionist pattern of the Regeneration. Attempts to return to the gold standard, suppress export taxes, and welcome what little foreign investment came near seemed to follow old free-trade dogmas. Coffee was the only export of importance, but the international market was very depressed, and there were serious doubts about whether it would expand again, or shrink everywhere as it was shrinking already in some districts. Perhaps a rubber or banana boom was coming. Nevertheless, the Brazilian valorization policy of 1906, and the recovery of prices after 1910, opened up a better future for coffee. The First World War closed European markets and increased dependence on the North American buyer, but the expansion of that market enabled it to absorb growing Colombian production without any trouble. In the second decade of the century there was some revival of the old haciendas, once again showing a profit.