[453]
Section 4th provides that the act shall go into operation “from and after the 15th day of August next.”
The Act of July 31, 1789.--Its title is: “An act to regulate the collection of duties imposed by law on the tonnage of ships or vessels, and on goods, wares and merchandises imported into the United States.”
The first thirty-seven sections of this act are taken up with laying off the sea-board of the eleven United States (mentioning each by its name) and a portion of the Ohio river into revenue districts, and in establishing ports of entry in the same, and in making sundry regulations; but neither is North Carolina nor Rhode Island named, nor is any portion or portions of their territory laid off into revenue districts.
The second paragraph of section 38 and the whole of section 39 of this act run as follows:
And whereas the States of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations and of North Carolina have not as yet ratified the present Constitution of the United States, by reason whereof this act doth not extend to the collecting of duties within either of the said two States, and it is thereby become necessary that the following provision with respect to goods, wares or merchandise imported from either of the said States should, for the present, take place: Section 39. Be it therefore further enacted, That all goods, wares and merchandize, not of their own growth or manufacture, which shall be imported from either of the said two States of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations or North Carolina, into any other port or place within the limits of the United States, as settled by the late treaty of peace, shall be subject to the like duties, seizures and forfeitures, as goods, wares or merchandize imported from any State or country without the said limits.Section 40 of this act provides that “no goods, wares or merchandize of foreign growth or manufacture subject to the payment of duties, shall be brought into the United States in any other manner than by sea, nor in any ship or vessel less than thirty tons burthen, except within the district of Louisville [on the Ohio river] and except also in such vessels as are now actually on their voyages, * * * * * and all goods, wares and merchandize brought into the United States by land, contrary to this act, shall be forfeited, together with the carriages, horses and oxen that shall be employed in conveying the same.” The Act of September 16th, 1789.--Its title is: “An act to suspend part of an act, [i. e., the act of July 31st] entitled ‘an act to regulate the collection of duties imposed by law,’ &c., &c., and for other purposes.”
