ed under the third section of this act, will form the subject of separate circular instructions.

WM. L. HODGE,

Acting Secretary of the Treasury.

CIRCULAR

INSTRUCTIONS TO COLLECTORS AND OTHER OFFICERS OF THE CUSTOMS RELATING TO MANIFESTS.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT, May 10, 1851.

The existing laws of the United States require that all vessels, whether American or foreign, coming from a foreign port, and bound to a port of the United States, shall, upon arriving within four leagues of the coast thereof, or within the limits of any collection district, produce to the proper officer of the revenue who may first board any such vessel, a full manifest of the cargo on board, detailing all the items thereof, the port or ports where the same may have been shipped, the names of the consignees thereof, and the different ports, if more than one, where the same is consigned or intended to be entered.

But the Department has ascertained that the execution of the salutary provision of the law on this subject has, in latter years, been in many ports greatly relaxed or entirely neglected, and masters of vessels are constantly permitted to make out and deliver their manifests after they have actually arrived at their port of entry.

The obvious protection to the revenue which this provision of law was intended to afford is thus greatly lessened; and, in cases of vessels bound to inland ports, great facilities are thus afforded for illegally landing portions of their cargo while passing up the great estuaries or rivers of the country, which portions thus landed, under the present practice of making out their manifests after reaching their port of entry, they can omit to report, but which otherwise would have to be accounted for if the return of it had been included upon a manifest delivered agreeably to law, on their first entering the waters of the United States.

Independent, however, of these circumstances, and of the manifest necessity of throwing around the collection of the revenue, all the guards against fraud which the law has provided and enjoined, the Department cannot, in a faithful discharge of its duties, allow so explicit a provision of the law to be relaxed, and still less to fall into disuse; and the collectors of the customs, the commanders of the revenue vessels, and all the boarding officers in the revenue service, are therefore required to carry the same into effect in future. The commanders of the revenue cutters are instruted to board all vessels from foreign parts arriving within the limits before referred to, and to demand and retain one copy of their manifest to be forwarded to the Collec

tor of the port to which said vessels may respectively be bound, and to make, as provided by law, the needed endorsement on another copy, to remain on board the vessel thus boarded; and if the masters of any such vessels should not have their manifests ready for delivery, the officer, if practicable, and if not attended with too great delay and inconvenience should remain on board until such manifest can be prepared and delivered to him. In all cases where the masters of such vessels from a foreign port have no manifests of their cargo ready for delivery when thus boarded, or who shall neglect or refuse to deliver them when demanded by such boarding officer, the latter is instructed to report the same to the collector of the port to which such vessel may be bound; and said collector will, prior to enforcing the penalty prescribed by law, make report to the Department, accompanied by an affidavit of the master of the vessel, setting forth the causes for neglecting to comply with the law and regulations, together with any extenuating facts or circumstances involved in the case, for the consideration and action of the Department. The commanders of the cutters and the boarding officers are further instructed to transmit, direct to this Department, monthly abstracts of all vessels thus boarded and reported to the collectors.

Although the Department is precluded from suspending or omitting to enforce the provisions of the law on this subject, yet, for the reasons before stated, and until proper notification of these instructions can be given, it will, in the exercise of the remitting power vested in it by law, extend such leniency and indulgence as the peculiar circumstances of the cases respectively may admit of, without hazarding the interests of the public revenue. But whatever leniency it may thus exercise, in such cases, in consequence of the erroneous practice which has existed for such a length of time in not properly enforcing the law on this subject, the penalty will be rigidly enforced in all cases where the masters of vessels were aware of the change in that respect, and of the existence of the present circular, previous to their leaving a foreign port for the United States.

The consuls and commercial agents of the United States abroad will be requested to take proper measures to give publicity to these regulations for the government of masters and owners of foreign vessels bound to the United States.

WM. L. HODGE,

Acting Secretary of the Treasury.

21

(GENERAL REGULATIONS, No. 29.)

TO COLLECTORS AND OTHER OFFICERS OF THE CUSTOMS.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT, July 19, 1854.

In view of the applications presented to the Department under the 8th section of the warehousing law of the 28th March, 1854, for relief from duties, in case of the destruction, in whole or in part, of bonded goods, while in warehouse or in transitu, under warehouse transportation bond, from one port to another, it is deemed proper to state, for the information and government of Collectors and other officers of the Customs, that the law proposes relief where actual injury is incurred, or the property is destroyed, in whole or in part, by accidental fire, shipwreek, or other like casualty, but does not provide for deterioration from dampness or other like cause in the warehouse or in transitu under bond.

Application for relief, under the 8th section of the act of 28th March, 1854, must be made in writing, under oath or affirmation, by the claimant to the Collector of the port where the alleged injury or destruction, in whole or in part, of the goods, wares, and merchandise, by accidental fire, or other like casualty, occurred, setting forth that the same happened while the goods remained in the custody of the officers of the Customs, in a public or private warehouse, under bond, or in the appraisers' stores, or while in transportation, under bond, describing the place and manner of the accident, together with the extent of the injury, loss, or destruction, and the precise time when sustained.

This statement must be accompanied by proof by affidavits of two or more credible and disinterested persons, as to the injury, loss, or destruction aforesaid.

On receipt of the foregoing application and statement, the Collector will subjoin thereto an official statement of the officers of the Customs, connected with the custody of the goods, as to the facts stated by the claimant, together with a statement going to show that the store or building in question was, at the time of the occurrence, a duly constituted bonded warehouse, under the law, or appraiser's store, as the case may be.

The Collector will report the foregoing to the Department, giving his views as to the character of the proof and the validity of the claim, stating the date of maturity and parties to each bond, the amount due on each, the amount of duties, if any, paid, together with any views or facts connected with the case he may deem useful in enabling the Department to discharge its duty under the law.

When damage is alleged to have occurred, in the course of transportation from one port to another, under bond, in pursuance of law and the regulations of the Department, the application of the party, sustained by evidence as heretofore prescribed, must be lodged with the Collector within ten days after the landing of the merchandise, and while the goods are in the possession of the officers of the Customs, and due appraisement will be made of the goods as alleged to be damaged, as in the case of damage occurring on voyage of direct importation from foreign ports.

It will be borne in mind, however, that no abatement of duties, satisfaction, or cancellation of the bonds will be made, under the 8th section of the act of the 28th March, 1854, without the previous sanction of the Department.

Collectors of the Customs, receiving entries of merchandise transported in bond, are further instructed to report such merchandise, in their weekly returns, as the part or the whole (as the case may be) of that included in the transportation bond, giving the name of the person who made the entry for transportation, and the date of his bond as reported by the Collector at port of withdrawal in the triplicate entry and certified invoice, in the column under the head of "Importer or owner,” and omitting the name of the consignee or person making re-warehousing entry, at port of destination, unless he be the same person who originally entered the merchandise for transportation.

When merchandise embraced in one entry is transported in various vehicles and at different times, on the arrival of the last parcel showing a full compliance with the transportation bond, the Collector, in his weekly return, will state, opposite such parcel, under the name of the person who made the entry for transportation, and the date of his bond, the words "full compliance," as per form D appended.

To prevent embarrassments to merchants and officers of the Customs, where merchandise is withdrawn for transportation, if, from any cause, the transportation papers cannot be forwarded by the first mail after its withdrawal, notice will be given by the Collector at the port of withdrawal by the first mail thereafter, to the Collector at port of destination of the fact of such withdrawal, accompanied by a statement of the description, quantity, consignee, and invoice value of the merchandise so withdrawn, in the form E, appended, to be followed by the second mail, by the triplicate entry and certified invoice in due form.

JAMES GUTHRIE,

Secretary of the Treasury.

NOTE. Accompanying the application for the cancelling bonds, as above, should be a copy of ship's protest and bill lading, properly certified, for all merchandise lost on rivers or lakes.

(GENERAL REGULATIONS No. 44.)

Under Reciprocity Treaty between the United States and Great Britain, of 5th June, 1854.

TO COLLECTORS AND OTHER OFFICERS OF THE CUSTOMS.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT, March 17, 1855.

The President of the United States has, by proclamation bearing date the 16th day of March, 1855, issued, in pursuance of authority vested in him by the act of Congress approved the 5th of August, 1854, entitled "An act to carry into effect a treaty between the United States and Great Britain," signed on the 5th day of June, eighteen hundred and fifty-four, declared, that satisfactory information having been received by him that the Imperial Parliament of Great Britain, and the Provincial Parliaments of Canada, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward's Island, have passed laws on their part to give full effect to the provisions of said treaty, the articles being the growth and produce of the above named provinces, enumerated in the schedule annexed to the third article of the treaty aforesaid, shall, from the date of said proclamation, be introduced into the United States free of duty, so long as said treaty shall remain in force, subject, however, to be suspended in relation to the trade with Canada, on the condition mentioned in the fourth article of said treaty. It therefore becomes the duty of this department, in order to carry into effect the provisions of the act approved March 2, 1855, entitled "An act to amend an act to carry into effect a treaty between the United States and Great Britain, signed on the 5th of June, 1854, and approved August 5, 1854," to issue the following instructions:

Collectors and other officers of the customs will immediately on receipt of this circular, transmit to the Department a statement of all the receipts issued at their respective offices, on entries for consumption of the articles specified in the schedule before referred to, in pursuance of the directions contained in Instructions to certain Collectors, dated the 16th October, 1854, and General Regulations No. 36, dated 10th November, 1854, which statement will show the names of the parties to whom issued, the amount of the duties for which the respective receipts were given, the quantity and description of the article or articles on which levied, the date of the entries, the name and nation of the vessel or other vehicle, and the places whence arriving. They will also transmit a statement of all bonds given upon entries for warehousing of the articles referred to, giving such particulars of the transaction as will show the true object of said bonds.

It will be perceived that agreeably to the stipulations of this treaty, from and after the 16th instant, the date of the President's proclamation, the articles enumerated in the 3d article thereof, when of the growth or production of