the United States, except upon the first clearing of such vessel in each year.

* SEC. 4222. No consul or consular agent of the United States shall exact tonnage fees from any vessel of the United States, touching at or near ports in Canada, on her regular voyage from one port to another within the United States, unless such consul or consular agent shall perform some official services, required by law for such vessel, when she shall thus touch at a Canadian port.

SEC. 4224. Vessels which pay tonnage duties once in a year shall pay the same either at their first clearance from or entry at, according to priority, a custom house in the United States in each calendar‡ year. Nothing in this section shall be construed to prevent customs officers from collecting such tonnage duty at the entry of vessels at their respective custom-houses during the calendar year if the same has not previously been paid for such year.

SEC. 4225. A duty of fifty cents per ton, to be denominated "light money," shall be levied and collected on all vessels not of the United States, which may enter the ports of the United States. Such lightmoney shall be levied and collected in the same manner and under the same regulations as the tonnage duties.

SEC. 4226. The preceding section shall not be deemed to operate upon unregistered vessels, owned by citizens of the United States, and carrying a sea-letter, or, other regular document, issued from a custom house of the United States, proving the vessel to be American property. Upon the entry of every such vessel from any foreign port, if the same shall be at the port at which the owner or any of the part owners reside, such owner or part owner shall make oath that the sea letter or other regular document possessed by such vessel contains the name or names of all the persons who are then the owners of the vessel; or if any part of such vessel has been sold or transferred since the date of such sealetter or document, that such is the case, and that no foreign subject or citizen has, to the best of his knowledge and belief, any share, by way of trust, confidence, or otherwise, in such vessel. If the owner or any part owner does not reside at the port or place at which such vessel shall enter, then the master shall make oath to the like effect. If the owner or part owner, where there is one, or the master, where there is no owner, shall refuse to so swear, such vessel shall not be entitled to the privileges granted by this section.

SEC. 4227. Nothing contained in this Title shall be deemed in anywise to impair any rights and privileges which have been or may be acquired by any foreign nation under the laws and treaties of the United States relative to the duty on tonnage of vessels, or any other duty on vessels.

TAX ON TONNAGE.

SEC. 11. That section fourteen of "An act to remove certain burdens on the American merchant marine and encourage the American foreign carrying trade, and for other purposes," approved June twenty-sixth, eighteen hundred and eighty-four, be amended so as to read as follows: "SEC. 14. That in lieu of the tax on tonnage of thirty cents per ton per annum imposed prior to July first, eighteen hundred and eightyfour, a duty of three cents per ton, not to exceed in the aggregate fifteen

* See sec. 2793.

cents per ton in any one year, is hereby imposed at each entry on all vessels which shall be entered in any port of the United States from any foreign port or place in North America, Central America, the West India Islands, the Bahama Islands, the Bermuda Islands, or the coast of South America bordering on the Caribbean Sea, or the Sandwich Islands, or Newfoundlaud; and a duty of six cents per ton, not to exceed thirty cents per ton per annum, is hereby imposed at each entry upon all vessels which shall be entered in the United States from any other foreign ports, not, however, to include vessels in distress or not engaged in trade: Provided, That the President of the United States shall suspend the collection of so much of the duty herein imposed, on vessels entered from any foreign port, as may be in excess of the tonnage and light-house dues, or other equivalent tax or taxes, imposed in said port on American vessels by the Government of the foreign country in which such port is situated, and shall, upon the passage of this act, and from time to time thereafter as often as it may become necessary by reason of changes in the laws of the foreign countries above mentioned, indicate by proclamation the ports to which such suspension shall apply, and the rate or rates of tonnage-duty, if any, to be collected under such suspension: Provided, further, That such proclamation shall exclude from the benefits of the suspension herein authorized the vessels of any foreign country in whose ports the fees or dues of any kind or nature imposed on vessels of the United States, or the import or export duties on their cargoes, are in excess of the fees, dues, or duties imposed on the vessels of the country in which such port is situated, or on the cargoes of such vessels; and sections forty two hundred and twentythree and forty-two hundred and twenty four, and so much of section forty-two hundred and nineteen of the Revised Statutes as conflicts with this section, are hereby repealed." (Act of June 19, 1886.)

DISCRIMINATING TONNAGE DUTIES.

SEC. 4228. Upon satisfactory proof being given to the President, by the government of any foreign nation, that no discriminating duties of tonnage or imposts are imposed or levied in the ports of such nation upon vessels wholly belonging to citizens of the United States, or upon the produce, manufactures, or merchandise imported in the same from the United States or from any foreign country, the President may issue his proclamation, declaring that the foreign discriminating duties of tonnage and impost within the United States are suspended and discontinued, so far as respects the vessels of such foreign nation, and the produce, manufactures, or merchandise imported into the United States from such foreign nation, or from any other foreign country; the suspension to take effect from the time of such notification being given to the President, and to continue so long as the reciprocal exemption of vessels, belonging to citizens of the United States, and their cargoes, shall be continued, and no longer.

SEC. 4229. No other or higher rate of duties shall be imposed or collected on vessels of Prussia, or of her dominions, from whencesoever coming, nor on their cargoes, howsoever composed, than are or may be payable on vessels of the United States, and their cargoes.

SEC. 4230. The preceding section shall continue and be in force during the time that the equality for which it provides shall, in all respects, be reciprocated in the ports of Prussia and her dominions; and if at

any time hereafter the equality shall not be reciprocated in the ports. of Prussia and her dominions, the President may issue his proclamation, declaring that fact, and thereupon the section preceding shall cease to be in force.

SEC. 4231. From Spanish vessels coming from any port or place in Spain or her colonies, where no discriminating or countervailing duties on tonnage are levied upon vessels of the United States, or from any other port or place to and with which vessels of the United States are ordinarily permitted to go and trade, there shall be exacted in the ports of the United States no other or greater duty on tonnage than at the time may be exacted of vessels of the United States.

SEC. 4232. The mail steamships employed in the mail-service between the United States and Brazil shall be exempt from all port-charges and custom house dues at the port of departure and arrival in the United States if, and so long as, a similar immunity from port-charges and custom-house dues is granted by the government of Brazil.

REFUND OF TAX OR PENALTIES.

SEC. 26. That whenever any fine, penalty, forfeiture, exaction, or charge arising under the laws relating to vessels or seamen has been paid to any collector of customs or consular officer, and application has been made within one year from such payment for the refunding or remission of the same, the Secretary of the Treasury, if on investigation he finds that such fine, penalty, forfeiture, exaction, or charge was illegally, improperly, or excessively imposed, shall have the power, either before or after the same has been covered into the Treasury, to refund so much of such fine, penalty, forfeiture, exaction, or charge as he may think proper, from any moneys in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated.

5.-BUREAU OF NAVIGATION.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That there shall be in the Department of the Treasury of the United States a Bureau of Navigation, under the immediate charge of a Commissioner of Navigation.

SEC. 2. That the Commissioner of Navigation, under the direction of the Secretary of the Treasury, shall have general superintendence of the commercial marine and merchant seamen of the United States, so far as vessels and seamen are not, under existing laws, subject to the supervision of any other officer of the Government. He shall be specially charged with the decision of all questions relating to the issue of registers, enrollments, and licenses of vessels, and to the filing and preservation of those documents; and whenever in title forty-eight or fifty of the Revised Statutes any of the above-named documents are required to be surrendered or returned to the Register of the Treasury, such requirement is hereby repealed, and such documents shall be surrendered and returned to the Commissioner of Navigation. Said Com. missioner shall have charge of all similar documents now in the keeping of the Register of the Treasury, and shall perform all the duties hitherto devolved upon said Register relating to navigation.

SEC. 3. That the Commissioner of Navigation shall be charged with the supervision of the laws relating to the admeasurement of vessels, and the assigning of signal letters thereto, and of designating their official number; and on all questions of interpretation growing out of the execution of the laws relating to these subjects, and relating to the collection of tonnage tax, and to the refund of such tax when collected erroneously or illegally, his decision shall be final.

SEC. 4. That the Commissioner of Navigation shall annually prepare and publish a list of vessels of the United States belonging to the commercial marine, specifying the official number, signal letters, names, rig, tonnage, home port, and place and date of building of every vessel, distinguishing in such list sailing-vessels from such as may be propelled by steam or other motive power. He shall also report annually to the Secretary of the Treasury the increase of vessels of the United States, by building or otherwise, specifying their number, rig, and motive power. He shall also investigate the operations of the law relative to naviga tion, and annually report to the Secretary of the Treasury such particulars as may, in his judgment, admit of improvement or may require amendment.

SEC. 5. That the Commissioner of Navigation shall, under the direc tion of the Secretary of the Treasury, be empowered to change the names of vessels of the United States, under such restrictions as may have been or shall be prescribed by act of Congress.

SEC. 6. That the Commissioner of Navigation shall be appointed by the President of the United States, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and shall receive a salary of four thousand dollars per annum. And the Secretary of the Treasury shall have power to transfer from existing Bureaus or divisions of the Treasury one clerk, to be designated as deputy commissioner of navigation, to act with the full powers of said Commissioner during his temporary absence from his official duty for any cause, and such additional clerks as he may consider necessary to the successful operation of the Bureau of Navigation, without impairing the efficiency of the Bureaus or divisions whence such clerks may be transferred?

SEC. 7. That this act shall be in force and take effect on and after July first, eighteen hundred and eighty-four.

Approved July 5, 1884.

[Circular.-Organization of the Bureau of Navigation.]

TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY,

To Officers of the Treasury Department:

Washington, D. C., July 18, 1884.

Whereas Congress, by an act approved July 5, 1884, authorized the establishment of a Bureau of Navigation in the Treasury Department, and charged a Commissioner with its control and management, subject to the direction of the Secretary of the Treasury, it is hereby ordered that said Commissioner shall have power to give instructions, over his own signature as Commissioner of Navigation, to collectors of customs in all matters essential to the fulfillment of the duties with which he is charged in the second, third, fourth, and fifth sections of said act, and address over his own signature all persons with whom in his judgment it may be necessary to communicate in furtherance of the objects for which said Bureau was established, and he will so organize his office that the duties prescribed in the act may be most promptly and efficiently performed.

The duties relating to navigation hitherto assigned to the Register of the Treasury having been devolved upon him, he will sign, as Commissioner of Navigation, the certificates of registry of vessels as authorized and required by section 415 of the Revised Statutes, and he will cause to be transmitted the requisite supply of forms of such instruments to collectors of customs; but he will treat as valid and still in force all such outstanding instruments as bear the signature of the Register of the Treasury, and will allow the issues of such instruments with the Register's signature till new ones with his own official signature can be supplied to collectors

The Commissioner of Navigation shall supervise the action of shipping commissioners as devolved upon the Secretary of the Treasury by the tenth section of the shipping act approved June 26, 1884, and, with the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, shall regulate the mode of conducting business in their offices, and perform such other duties pertaining to the care of seamen as would devolve upon the Secre tary of the Treasury by virtue of the provisions of the said act or Title LIII of the Revised Statutes.

He will also give instructions to the collectors of customs in regard to the documenting of vessels and their clearance, entry, and movements, and the collection of tonnage duties therefrom as far as they may be required by the provisions of said shipping act and Titles XXXIV and XLVIII of the Revised Statutes.

He shall issue also to collectors of customs such instructions in regard to the entry of vessels into ports subject to quarantine as may be required by the public health and permitted by Title LVIII of the Revised Statutes.

In all cases in which it is necessary for the head of the Bureau of Navigation to communicate with the head of a Department, he will make such communication through the Secretary of the Treasury.

For the guidance of the Commissioner of Navigation in respects not necessary to be here enumerated, he is referred to the act itself, herewith published.

CHAS. J. FOLGER,

Secretary.

6. ABOLISHMENT OF CERTAIN FEES.

SEC. 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That on and after July first, eighteen hundred and eighty-six, no fees shall be charged or collected by collectors or other officers of customs, or by inspectors of steam-vessels or shipping commissioners, for the following services to vessels of the United States, to wit: Measurement of tonnage and cer tifying the same; issuing of license or granting of certificate of registry, record, or enrollment, including all indorsements on the same and bond and oath; indorsement of change of master; certifying and receiving manifest, including master's oath and permit; granting permit to vessels licensed for the fisheries to touch and trade; granting certificate of payment of tonnage dues; recording bill of sale, mortgage, hypothecation, or conveyance, or the discharge of such mortgage or hypothecation; furnishing certificate of title; furnishing the crew-list, including bond; certificate of protection to seamen; bill of health; shipping or discharging of seamen, as provided by title fifty-three of the Revised Statutes and section two of this act; apprenticing boys to the merchant service; inspecting, examining, and licensing steam vessels, including inspection certificate and copies thereof; and licensing of master, engineer, pilot, or mate of a vessel; and all provisions of laws authorizing or requiring the collection of fees for such services are repealed, such repeal to take effect July first, eighteen hundred and eighty-six. Collectors or other officers of customs, inspectors of steam-vessels, and shipping commissioners who are paid wholly or partly by fees shall make a detailed report of such services, and the fees provided by law, to the