Directory_and_Chronicle_1875 — Page 698

ACT.

AMERICAN PASSENGERS' ACT.

255

to be applied to the objects of their appointment; and if there be more than one board or commission who shall claim such payment, the Secretary of the Treasury for the time being, shall determine which is entitled to receive the same, and his decision in the premises shall be final and without appeal; Provided, That the payment shall, in no case, be awarded or made to any board, or commission, or association, formed for the protection or advancement of any particular class of emigrants of any particular nation or creed; and if the master, captain, owner, or consignee of any ship or vessel, refuse or neglect to pay to the collector the sum and sums of money required, and within the time prescribed by this section, he or they shall severally forfeit and pay the sum of fifty dollars, in addition to such sum of ten dollars, for each and every passenger upon whose death the same has become payable, to be recovered by the United States, in any circuit or district court of the United States where such vessel may arrive, or such master, captain, owner, or consignee may reside; and when recovered, the said money shall be disposed of in the same manner as is directed with respect to the sum and sums required to pay to the collector of customs.

SEC. 15. And be it further enacted, That the amount of the several penalties imposed by the foregoing provisions regulating the carriage of passengers in merchant vessels, shall be liens on the vessel or vessels violating those provisions, and such vessel or vessels shall be libelled therefor in any circuit or district court of the United States, where such vessel or vessels shall arrive.

SEC. 16.—And be it further enacted, That all and every vessel or vessels which shall or may be employed by the American Colonization Secretary, or the Colonization Society of any State, to transport, and which shall actually transport, from any port or ports of the United States, to any colony or colonies on the west coast of Africa, colored emigrants, to reside there, shall be, and the same are hereby, subject to the operation of the foregoing provisions, regulating the carriage of passengers in merchant vessels. SEC. 17. And be it further enacted, That the collector of the customs shall examine each emigrant ship or vessel, on its arrival at his port, and ascertain and report to the Secretary of the Treasury the time of sailing, the length of the voyage, the ventilation, number of the passengers, their space on board, their food, the native country of the emigrants, the number of deaths, the age and sex of those who died during the voyage; together with his opinion of the cause of the mortality, if any, on board, and, if none, what precautionary measures, arrangements, or habits are supposed to have had any and what agency in causing the exemption.

SEC. 18. And be it further enacted, That this Act shall take effect, with respect to vessels sailing from ports in the United States, on the eastern side of the Continent, within thirty days from the time of its approval; and with respect to vessels sailing from ports in the United States on the western side of the Continent, and from ports in Europe, within sixty days from the time of its approval, and with respect to vessels sailing from ports in other parts of the world, within six months from the time of its approval. And it is hereby made the duty of the Secretary of State to give notice, in the ports of Europe, and elsewhere, of this Act, in such manner as he shall deem proper.

SEC. 19. And be it further enacted, That from and after the time that this Act shall take effect with respect to any vessels, then, in respect to such vessels, the Act of second March, eighteen hundred and nineteen, entitled "An Act regulating passenger ships and vessels," the Act of twenty-second of February, eighteen hundred and forty-seven, entitled "An Act to regulate the carriage of passengers in merchant vessels;" the Act of second March, eighteen hundred and forty-seven, entitled "An Act to amend an Act entitled 'An Act to regulate the carriage of passengers in merchant vessels, and to determine the time when said Act shall take effect;"" the Act of thirty-first January, eighteen hundred and forty-eight, entitled "An Act exempting vessels employed by the American Colonization Society in transporting colored emigrants from the United States to the coast of Africa, from the provisions of the Act of the twenty-second February and second of March, eighteen hundred and forty-seven, regulating the carriage of passengers in merchant vessels;" the Act of seventeenth May, eighteen hundred and forty-eight, entitled "An Act to provide for the ventilation of passenger vessels, and for other purposes :" and the Act of third March, eighteen hundred and