II. half to five cents; pepper, six cents; pimento, four cents; CHAPTER snuff, ten cents; indigo, twenty-five cents; unwrought steel, seventy-five cents the hundred weight; cables and 1790. tarred cordage, one dollar; untarred cordage and yarn, one dollar and fifty cents; twine and pack-thread, three dollars; salt, twelve cents per bushel; coal, three cents; carriages of all sorts, fifteen per cent. ad valorem; glass and china-ware, twelve and a half per cent. ad valorem ; marble, slate, brick, tiles, and all utensils of marble and slate, paper of all sorts, pictures, prints, clocks, watches, spices not before enumerated, fruits, preserves, pickles, oil, and ground mustard, ten per cent. ad valorem; medicinal drugs, except dye-stuffs, carpets, velvets, satins, and other silk goods, cambrics, muslins, lawns, laces, gauzes, chintzes, colored calicoes, and nankeens, seven and a half per cent. ad valorem. On other articles the duties remained as by the former tariff, with exception of the following, added to the free list: bullion, plaster of Paris, the sea-stores of ships, the clothes, books, tools, and furniture of immigrants, philosophical apparatus imported for seminaries of learning, goods designed to be re-exported in the same vessel, and all goods of the growth or production of the United States. The discount of ten per cent. on the duties of goods imported in American vessels was discontinued, being replaced by an additional ten per cent. when the importation was in foreign vessels. The success which had attended the collection of the duties imposed at the former session had greatly increased the confidence of Congress in this source of revenue. The Senate, which, through fear of smuggling, had, at the first session, cut down the duties imposed by the House, now led off in the other direction. The bill, as it passed the House, proposed only a general increase of one third in the then existing duties, with a CHAPTER special increase on some particular articles; but in the II. Senate this bill was completely remodeled, the old act 1790. being repealed, and a new one substituted, including the The increased duties above stated. Gerry, Sedgwick, and For the final settlement of accounts between the states and the Union, the federal ratio, as it might be determined under an act for a census already passed, was adopted as the rule for the apportionment of quotas to the several states; and for bringing the settlement to an immediate conclusion, a new board of three commissioners was constituted, with full power to liquidate and allow all unsettled claims on general principles of equity, although such claims might not be sanctioned by resolves of the Continental Congress, or supported by regular vouchers. It was further provided (and this was the important matter) that such states as might be found, CHAPTER II. on this settlement, to be in advance to the Union, should be entitled to have the balances due them funded on the 1790. same terms with the assumed debt, except that these balances should not be transferable. As, by the terms of the Funding Act, the interest on the domestic debt for the current year was to be converted into principal, a considerable unappropriated sum of money would accumulate in the treasury. Prudence would have suggested that a balance of cash in hand would be exceedingly convenient, if not absolutely necessary, for the ordinary operations of the treasury department. Congress, however, provided that all the surplus in the treasury on the last day of the following December, after payment of the appropriations of the present session, should be applied to the reduction of the public debt; this sum, together with two millions more which the president was authorized to borrow, to constitute a fund, to be employed, under the management of a board composed of the Chief Justice, the President of the Senate, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, and the Attorney General, in the purchase of securities of the United States at their market value, if not above par. These securities, so purchased, were to be vested in the board, and the interest thereon, by the provision of a subsequent act, was to be applied to the purchase of further securities, with a reserve, however, toward the discharge of the borrowed two millions, principal and interest. Such was the sinking fund as originally established, though not yet known by that name. One object in establishing this sinking fund was to raise the stock in the market, in order to prevent transfers to Europe at depreciated rates. Besides these acts, more immediately connected with CHAPTER the funding system, several other laws were passed, of II. great interest and importance. 1790. An act providing a uniform rule of naturalization authorized all courts of record to entertain the application of "alien free white persons" who had resided within the United States for two years, and on proof of good character, and their taking an oath or affirmation to support the Constitution, to admit such persons as citizens; but no person who had been disfranchised by any state, under any laws passed during the Revolution, was to be readmitted as a citizen, except by a legislative act of the state to which he had formerly belonged. The method of procedure above prescribed for the process of naturalization has ever since been preserved, the power of admitting new citizens being still possessed by all courts of record; but the necessary preliminary residence, as will presently appear, has been extended, and a declaration required, preliminary to the actual naturalization, of an intention to become a citizen. An act "to promote the useful arts" secured to citizens of the United States, the inventors of new machines or processes, or of improvements upon old ones, the right to enjoy, under letters patent, to be issued by a board, consisting of the secretaries of State and War and the Attorney General, the sole and exclusive use of their inventions during a period of fourteen years. Two years after, the sole management of matters relating to patents was intrusted to the Secretary of State. In 1836, the growing extent of this business led to the appointment of a special officer, subordinate to that department, called Commissioner of Patents, to whom was given authority, in cases which might seem to merit such indulgence, to give an extension to patents for seven additional years. This office of Commissioner of Patents II. now constitutes one of the bureaus of the recently-estab- CHAPTER lished Home Department. An act "for the encouragement of learning" secured 1790. to authors, "residents in the United States," a copy-right for fourteen years, and if the author were living at the end of that period, for an additional term of fourteen years. By an act passed in 1834, the original term has been doubled, and the benefit of a renewal secured to the wife and children of the author. An act "for the government and regulation of seamen," based on the ancient maritime usages of the country, and still in force, with some modifications, required a written contract to be entered into specifying the voyage and the rate of wages. Without such contract, the terms of which were to be rigorously enforced, the master had no hold upon his men, and was liable to pay them, for any services rendered, the highest current rate of wages. Mariners who had once signed the shipping articles, as this contract was called, absenting themselves or deserting, were not only liable to forfeiture of their pay, but might be taken on board by force and compelled to serve. No native mariner could be left abroad under severe penalties. The ship itself was made liable Every vessel was required chest, and a certain supply for the wages of the seamen. |