Statement of the amount of allowances paid to each State. Maine.... New Hampshire.. Connecticut..... Rhode Island........ Total.. $3,762.500 552,693 7,532,798 182,853 78,890 18,319 479 12, 128, 532 Statement exhibiting the rate of duty on salt consumed in the United States for the following years: Number of vessels, men, and tonnage in the cod fisheries, 1858. NOTE. The returns of tonnage in the mackerel fisheries were not required to be made separate from the cod fishery prior to 1830. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, Register's Office, January 16, 1858. C. F. BIGGER, Register. Brief synopsis of laws relating to fishing bounties. The act of Congress of 4th July, 1789, the first laying a duty on goods, wares, and merchandise imported into the United States imposed on salt the duty of six cents per bushel. The fourth section gave a bounty of five cents for every quintal of dried fish, every barrel of pickled fish, and salt provisions exported to foreign countries, in lieu of drawback of the duties on the importation of the salt employed and expended therein. Limited to seven years. The act of 10th August, 1790, raised the duty to twelve cents per bushel, and the bounty in lieu of drawback to ten cents per quintal or barrel. To continue till the debts of the United States were paid. The act of 16th February, 1792, referring to the existing bounty on the export of dried fish, gave, "in lieu of drawback of duties on the salt used in preserving the same," a bounty on the tonnage of vessels employed in the Bank and other cod fisheries, during the season specified, under certain conditions. This bounty was on vessels between five and twenty tons, $1 per ton; between twenty and thirty tons, $1 50; and above thirty tons, $2 50; provided that no vessel shall be allowed more than $170. By the second section of the act of 2d May, 1792, the impost duty on salt was increased, by requiring each fifty-six pounds to be reckoned as a bushel. The solar salt, used in the fisheries, usually weighed from seventy to eighty pounds per measured bushel. To correspond with. this enhancement of duty, the sixth section of the act added 20 per cent. to the fishing bounty. Limited to two years. The act of 8th July, 1797, increased the duty on salt to 20 cents per bushel, and added 33 per cent. to the fishing bounty. This increased duty on salt and bounty on fishing vessels were originally limited to two years, and to the end of the next session of Congress. By act of 7th May, 1800, the duty and bounty were extended for ten years, with a proviso that the bounties should cease with the duties. The act of 3d March, 1807, repeals all laws imposing duty on imported salt, and repeals all bounties and drawbacks on fish and provisions. The act of 28th June, 1809, authorizes accounting officers to allow to collectors all payments made by them for fishing bounties to 31st December, 1807. The 1st section of act of 29th July, 1813, imposed a duty of 20 cents per bushel on salt. 2d section provides bounty of 20 cents per pound on pickled fish exported. 5th section gives bounties on tonnage of vessels employed in Bank and other cod fisheries, under similar provisions as those of act of 1792, as follows: Provided, that no vessel be allowed more than $272. By its terms this act was to remain in force only during the existing war with Great Britain. The act of 9th February, 1816, continued act of 1813 in force indefinitely. Act of 3d March, 1819, increased fishing bounties as follows: On vessels from 5 to 30 tons....... $3 50 per ton, 4 00 And where the crew was ten men or more, $3 50 per ton for season of three and a half months, provided that no allowance shall exceed $360. This was the first act where fishing bounty did not expressly depend on the duty on salt, by its terms. D. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge your letter of the 5th instant, enclosing a bill repealing all laws or parts of laws allowing bounties to vessels employed in the Bank or other cod fisheries, and a resolution of the legislature of the State of Maine in relation to the bounty on cod fisheries. You request any information in this department concerning the measure, and also my own views respecting the same. Allow me to refer you to a letter dated the 2d of January last, addressed to you by my predecessor, which embraces the results of an examination made here, and to the report of an agent appointed to examine into this subject in the districts where this fishery is carried on, appended to the annual report of my predecessor of 6th December, 1853, for the information you request. It would seem that the grounds upon which the fishing bounty was given by law have ceased to exist. The amounts annually paid out of the treasury on account of this bounty now exceed the entire sums received for duties on salt imported and consumed for all purposes whatever. In his report, before referred to, my predecessor recommended that the fishing bounty be repealed, and I concur in that recommendation. The papers enclosed with your letter are herewith returned. Very respectfully, your obedient servant, Hon. C. C. CLAY, Jr., HOWELL COBB, Secretary of the Treasury. Chairman Committee on Commerce, Senate U. S. E. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, January 2, 1858. SIR: Agreeably to your request, I herewith enclose a synopsis of the legislation on the subject of bounty to vessels engaged in the cod fishery. It is apparent, from the slightest glance at these provisions, that they were not intended to foster that pursuit, but simply to relieve that fishery from the burden imposed on it by the salt duty. In 1792, when this system commenced, all the salt used in this country was imported, and was subject to duty. Vast quantities of this salt were then employed in curing codfish to be dried for exportation. It was a leading pursuit on the eastern Atlantic coast, and furnished the country with one of its principal staples for foreign commerce. The guards required by the drawback laws would subject the cod fishery to impracticable details to enable it to reclaim the duty on the salt ne cessarily consumed. The only just and effectual mode which could be devised for indemnifying the fishery against this burden of duty was to give a bounty on the tonnage employed, graduated according to the quantity of salt consumed by each class of vessels. The only feature in the bounty laws which can be regarded as intended to afford the slightest encouragement to the cod fishery is that which provides that no bounty shall be allowed to any vessel unless the crew are compensated according to the quantity of fish caught by each man. This provision was not, probably, intended as an encouragement to the fishery, but to promote rivalry and enterprise among the crew; that the mere fact that the vessel had a crew on board should not be sufficient, unless they diligently followed the fishery, which this condition was well calculated to effect. It will be seen that the original bounty law of 1792 was repealed with the salt duty in 1807. When the duty on salt was reimposed in 1813, in consequence of the then existing war, the former bounty laws were re-enacted with similar conditions. When the bounties were increased to their present rate per ton on fishing vessels, by act of 3d March, 1819, the duty on salt, under the act of 27th April, 1816, was 20 cents for every 56 pounds. The present duty, under the act of 1846, is 20 per cent ad valorem, which, on the importation of 15,405,864 bushels last year, valued at $1,991,065 by the custom-house books, makes the duty within a fraction of 2.57 cents per bushel. It is to be understood that since 1792, the date of the original law, a revolution has occurred in the mode and object of the fisheries. There was then no mackerel fishery; it is now more extensive and important than the cod fishery. Many of the vessels under cod fishing licences are employed in catching fish, not for dry-curing under the bounty laws, but for sale in a fresh condition, being preserved in ice for consumption in that state in the cities, as well as throughout the interior of the country, to which it is carried by means of the railroads. The great change which has taken place of late years in the manner and purpose of the fisheries, has led, not to the encouragement of the cod fishery under the bounty laws, but to the commission of perjuries for the purpose of obtaining bounty under those laws. Hundreds of vessels, on board of which no fish were caught for dry-curing, which is essential to entitle them to bounty, have claimed and been allowed upon false statements, as has been subsequently made apparent. Representations of this abuse being made to this department, the existing laws and regulations were brought together into the circular of February 20, 1852, which was sent to the collectors for strict enforcement. Immediately on the promulgation of this circular, a committee from the fishing interest at Gloucester, Massachusetts, one of the principal fishing districts of the country, appeared here, and represented that, should this circular be rigidly enforced, no bounties could be paid. Among other objections to its provisions, they stated that the mode of carrying on the fisheries had essentially changed; that few or none of the fishermen at the present time were in fact compensated in the Rep. Com. 10-2 |