7242/1871.
No. 674.
(GENERAL.)
SOLICITOR TO THE CUSTOMS to THE BOARD OF TRADE.
OPINION.
THE 279th section (part 2) evidently contemplates a certificate under the hand of the Consular Officer, and the stamped endorsement, which appears to have been impressed upon the Articles of Agreement in this case is, I am satisfied, not in accordance with the requirements of the Act.
The Consul no doubt is saved some trouble and time in using a seal applicable to the simple fact of entry of the ship, deposit of papers, and their return. But the above cited section of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1854, requires him to endorse on the agreement a certificate stating when the ship's papers were respectively delivered and returned. The papers specified in Article 1 of that section are the agreement with the crew and the indentures and assignments of apprenticeship. These when delivered to the Consul are not sufficiently described by the general term "papers." They should be described as agreements or, as the case may be, indentures on assignments of apprenticeship. It is clear from the whole tenor of section 279 that a very special duty is imposed on Consuls by that section, and especially by Article 3, and this with the object of facilitating proof in case of a prosecution for penalties for the illegal conduct of masters abroad.
The salutary aim of the Act would be entirely frustrated by the introduction of a practice of stamping, for the simple reason that no lawyer would attempt to put in as evidence agreements so stamped. No court would receive them as such, not being in any respect in accordance with the requirements and directions of the Act, 279th section,
Customs, November 25, 1870.
(Signed) J. O'DOWD.
0 10378-175. 95.-5/86.
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