COMMERCIAL TREATY BETWEEN UNITED STATES AND CHINA
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from the date of the exchange of the ratifications hereof. If no revision is demanded before the end of the first term of ten years, then these articles in their present form shall remain in full force for a further term of ten years reckoned from the end of the first term and so on for successive periods of ten years.
The English and Chinese texts of the present Treaty and its three Annexes have been carefully compared; but, in the event of there being any difference of meaning between them,, the sense as expressed in the English text shall be held to be the correct one.
This Treaty and its three Annexes shall be ratified by the two high contracting parties in conformity with their respective constitutions, and the ratifications shall be exchanged in Washington not later than twelve months from the present date.
In testimony whereof, we, the undersigned, by virtue of our respective powers, have signed this Treaty in duplicate in the English and Chinese languages, and have affixed our respective seals.
Done at Shanghai, this eighth day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and three, and in the twenty-ninth year of Kuang Hsü eighth month and eighteenth day.
ANNEX I.
As citizens of the United States are already forbidden by Treaty to deal in or handle opium, no mention has been made in this Treaty of opium taxation.
As the trade in salt is a Government monopoly in China, no mention has been made in this Treaty of salt taxation.
It is, however, understood, after full discussion and consideration, that the col- lection of inland duties on opiumn and salt and the means for the protection of the revenue therefrom and for preventing illicit traffic therein are left to be adininistered by the Chinese Government in such manner as shall in no wise interfere with the provision of Article IV. of this Treaty regarding the unobstructed transit of other goods.
ANNEX II.
Article IV. of the Treaty of Commerce between the United States and China of this date provides for the retention of the native Customs offices at the open ports. For the purpose of safeguarding the revenue of China at such places, it is understood that the Chinese Government shall be entitled to establish and maintain such branch native · Customs offices at each open port within a reasonable distance of the main native Customs offices at the port, as shall be deemed by the authorities of the Imperial Maritime Customs at that port necessary to collect the revenue from the trade into and out of such port. Such branches, as well as the principal native Customs offices at each open port, shall be administered by the Imperial Maritime Customs as pro- vided by the Protocol of 1901.
ANNEX III.
The schedule of tariff duties on imported goods annexed to this Treaty under Article V. is hereby mutually declared to be the schedule agreed upon between the representatives of China and of the United States and signed by John Goodnow for the United States and Their Excellencies Lü Hai-huan and Sheng Hsüan-huai for China at Shanghai on the sixth day of September, A.D. 1902, according to the Proto- col of the seventh day of September, A.D. 1901.
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