cannot be embraced in a single invoice, and be covered by a single consular certificate. The merchandise shipped by each vessel must be embraced in a distinct invoice, duly verified, if on foreign account, by the oath of the owner, and authenticated by a consular certificate. Shipments of 681. Foreign merchandise destined for a port of merchandise the United States by way of the river St. Lawrence, by the way of the St. Law- is not unfrequently transhipped from the importing rence. vessel to one or more vessels of light draught, and on arrival at the port of destination is found to be unaccompanied by the documents entitling it to entry. Where all the articles embraced in the invoice are transhipped on the St. Lawrence to a single vessel, the proper invoice must be presented on entry, together with a copy of the clearance from the foreign port of exportation of the vessel from which the transhipment took place, certified to be a true copy by the collector or other chief revenue officer of the Canadian port at which the vessel was entered. When the articles embraced in a single invoice are transhipped on the St. Lawrence to several vessels, they will be admitted to entry on the production of the proper invoice, and a statement under oath of the person or agent superintending the transhipment, describing the articles, by numbers, marks, etc., transhipped to each vessel, and stating in what invoice they are embraced, together with the certified copy of the clearance of the importing vessel, as above required. CHAPTER XXXV. VERIFICATION OF INVOICES. Voices cer re 682. THE revenue laws of the United States re- Consular quire two consular certificates only to invoices of tificates to inforeign merchandise imported into the country, (the quired. owners of which reside abroad)-one authenticating the invoice, the other as to the value in Spanish or American dollars of the currency in which the invoice is made out. fied. 683. Where consular certificates to invoices of where invoices goods destined for the United States are required, are to be verithey are to be granted only by the consular officer within whose consular jurisdiction such goods have been manufactured or prepared for exportation. A practice, it is understood, has extensively prevailed of transmitting invoices to a consular officer at the port of shipment for the usual consular certificates, whose certificate must often necessarily be given without due knowledge of their accuracy or details. Thus, invoices of goods manufactured or prepared for shipment in Switzerland have sometimes heretofore been sworn to at Havre; invoices from Lyons have been verified at Marseilles; and those from the Prussian provinces of the Rhine, at the ports of Holland and Belgium. It is manifest that great abuses must spring from such a practice, the meaning and intent of the law being to require those who have an accurate knowledge of the contents of in Forms of cer voices. voices and the prices of goods comprising the same, sular officers, therefore, are strictly enjoined to 684. Under the provisions of the act of Congress tificates to in- of March first, eighteen hundred and twenty-three, the invoices of all imported goods subject to ad valorem duty belonging to persons not residing in the United States, must be sworn to and verified by consular certificates, according to Form No. 22 or No. 23, as the case may be; the oath must be taken by the owner or manufacturer of the goods, or a member of the firm owning or manufacturing them, and not by a clerk or other subordinate. Magistrate's authenticated. 685. In all cases where the oaths to invoices are certificate to be not taken before the United States consul, but before some public officer duly authorized to administer oaths in the country where the goods shall have been purchased, the official certificate of such officer must be authenticated by a consular officer of the United States. Mode of verifi there is no con the country. 686. If there be no consular officer of the United cation when States in the country from which the merchandise sular officer in shall have been imported, the authentication must be executed by a consul of a nation at the time in amity with the United States, if there be any such residing there. If there be no such consul, the authentication must be made by two respectable merchants, if any such there be, residing at the port from which the merchandise shall have been imported. 687. It is proper that the oath taken by foreigners to be adminis should be administered to them, not only in their own Oaths to for- fied. 688. The attention of consular officers is also di- What invoices rected to the eighth and eleventh sections of the act are to be veriof Congress of the first of March, eighteen hundred and twenty-three, in which it will be seen that a consular certificate is required in all cases of invoices of goods exported by the manufacturers thereof, in whole or in part for their account, notwithstanding another owner in part may reside in the United States. This provision of the law of 1823, there is reason to believe, has been hitherto overlooked in many instances. cases of per 689. If a consular officer ascertains and has reli- Duty of a conable evidence of the falsity of an oath, administered sular officer in either by himself or by a local magistrate whose cer- jury. tificate he has authenticated, he should notify the Treasury Department, which will transmit to him the original invoice and oath, to be used, if deemed expedient, in a prosecution for perjury. tificate. 690. It is to be remarked that, by the act of March Currency certhird, eighteen hundred and one, invoices of all goods imported into the United States subjected to a duty ad valorem are required to be "made out in the currency of the place or country from whence the importation shall be made; and shall contain a true statement of the actual cost of such goods in such foreign currency or currencies, without any respect to the value of the coins of the United States, or foreign coins which now are, or shall be, by law, made current within the United States in such foreign place or country." Hence, invoices of free goods are not required to be made out in the currency of the country from whence Depreciated the goods may be imported; but whenever invoices of such goods may be made out in the currency of the country, and said currency is depreciated, and its value not fixed by any law of the United States, a consular certificate of the value of such currency must, as before intimated, accompany the same. currency. Invoices of free goods. Certificate in 691. There is nothing in the law or instructions of the Treasury Department to prohibit invoices of free goods from being made out in the currency of the United States, or that of any other country where its value is fixed by our laws. 692. Invoices of ad valorem or free goods, when cases of depre- made out in a foreign depreciated currency, or a cur ciated rency. cur Mode of mak certificate. rency the value of which is not fixed by the laws of the United States, whether the importer or owner resides in this country or abroad, must in each case be accompanied by a consular certificate, showing the value of such currency in Spanish or United States silver dollars, according to Form No. 24. 693. Consular officers will either make their cering a consular tificate upon the invoice itself, or, when it is attached as a separate document, give such details as to the names of the shippers, consignees, vessels and captains, the nature of the merchandise, and the total amount, as will fully identify the invoice annexed, instead of giving, as sometimes heretofore, their certificates in such general terms as to admit of the deception, which the Department is informed has been practised, of substituting another invoice in place of the one for which the certificate was originally issued. |