TREASURY DEPARTMENT, February 22, 1849. SIR: This Department, under the authority granted by the 5th section of the warehousing law of the 6th August, 1846, has issued new and additional regulations, a copy of which, marked A, will be found annexed. These regulations are based upon an experience of the practical operation of the law in this country during the last two years, as well as upon very full information upon the same subject obtained from the continent of Europe, and also from Great Britain. It is believed that there is scarcely an act passed by the British Parliament that has aided more than her warehousing law to augment her manufactures, commerce, tonnage, and revenue. This is the opinion of all her statesmen and business classes, and not a vote, it is believed, could be obtained in either House of Parliament for its repeal, although in its inception the system encountered even greater and more violent opposition there than in our own country. Since it was perfected there, the commerce of Great Britain has more than quadrupled, the bonded goods remaining in warehouse having risen in August, 1847, according to the statement of the commissioners, attached to my report of December, 1847, to the value of $387,200,000. The docks, structures, and buildings in which these goods were stored, cost in London alone, according to the same statement, $40,000,000; and in the whole British empire, are estimated at nearly double that sum. It is thus seen how Great Britain has made herself the centre of universal commerce and exchanges, and the storehouse of the business of the world. She has the almost incredible amount of near four hundred millions of foreign imports stored in her docks and warehouses, so as to furnish assorted cargoes of every product and fabric of the earth, and of every class, description, and quality. She thus makes herself the factor of all nations, and the productions of the industry of all mankind are stored in her warehouses, and sold by her merchants to the people of every country. The profit 'thus realized is immense, and draws with it the command of the trade and business and specie of the world. Side by side with these warehoused foreign goods, are her own products and fabrics, ready for sale at home and abroad. In bringing to her ports the vessels of all nations for cargoes of all foreign productions, the purchasers, to complete assortments, also take with them vast amounts of British articles, and thus Great Britain, whilst commanding the commerce and specie of other countries, augments the sale of her own products and fabrics. An attentive examination of the globe, and of the relative position of its several countries, will exhibit our great advantages over Great Britain as a centre for universal commerce. The latter has no great interior country to supply any of her ports with business; she has no mighty lakes or rivers, no great expanse of surface, nor can she be connected with the Continent by railroads or canals. Her soil is less fertile, her climate less genial and favorable, embracing by no means such a variety of products; and great as are her mineral resources, they are by no means equal in extent or number to our own. Her position is less central, having north of her much less than one-tenth of the arable surface of the globe, and less also than one-tenth of its population; whereas, if we turn to our own country, in view both of latitude and longitude combined, with our fronts upon both oceans and upon the Gulf, we are, as nearly as can be, the centre of the arable surface, the population, and business of the world. Our great interior lakes and rivers, with our rapidly-extending net work of railroads and canals, bringing to our ports the interior commerce of a continent with numerous deep and capacious harbors on both oceans, accessible at all times, and with every variety of climate, soil, and product, mineral and agricultural, give to us an unrivalled position. That Great Britain, nevertheless, with so many local disadvantages, should have made herself the centre of universal trade, is the highest proof of the genius and enterprise, the energy and perseverance, and especially the wise legislation on this subject of that great country. After the most deliberate investigation during the last three years, it is my firm conviction that without her warehousing system, cherished and improved as it has been from time to time, she never would have achieved these great results; that it is mainly this system which has made her the store-house of the world, and, giving her the command of the carrying trade, has filled her vessels with cargoes for her own use or reëxportation. In her great docks and warehouses are stored the products and fabrics of all countries together with her own, and she has thus become the point where international exchanges are made, and where trade and specie have centered. If we would enter into a fair and honorable competition with her for this carrying trade, and commerce and specie, we must avail ourselves of the lights of experience, and introduce here, with some changes adapted to our position, a similar warehousing system. When foreign or American vessels come to our own ports, they must be enabled here, as in Great Britain, to load and unload with the utmost facility, economy, and despatch, at all times and in all seasons. They must also be enabled to obtain, without delay, in our ports, assorted cargoes of our own products and fabrics, as well as those of all other countries, of every quality, character, and price. These foreign and domestic products and fabrics must be collected in our warehouses as they are in London, ready at all times for immediate purchase and shipment, so that any vessel arriving at our ports can always obtain at once full and assorted cargoes. It is only thus that vessels sure of return cargoes can be brought to our ports on the best terms, diminishing freights, whilst augmenting our carrying trade and aggregate profits of navigation. It will be perceived, on examination of the new regulations hereto appended, that this Department, as indicated in my reports of December, 1847 and 1848, has introduced the system of private competition for storage to the full extent authorized by existing laws, combining, as permitted thereby, public and private stores, and protecting the interests of the Government and merchant by every safeguard in the power of the Department, suggested by experience and investigation. In order, however, to give our warehousing system all the advantages that are possessed in Great Britain, the following changes are indispensable. The provisions of the act of 17th June, 1844, limiting the inspectors to the number employed at that date, must be modified in some respects, as these officers are required by the warehousing laws to keep the key and have charge of private bonded stores. If these private stores are to be scattered over our great ports, as the convenience of commerce may dictate, and as to a fair and reasonable extent they should be, under proper regulations, if the warehousing business should progress as it has done for the last two years, the inspectors must be augmented beyond the number authorized by that act. The warehousing act allows the importer, whose private store is used for the warehousing of foreign goods on which the duties have not been paid, to keep one key, and requires an inspector of the revenue to keep another, the law directing a joint custody with two different kinds of locks and different keys in the possession of each, respectively, so that the importer could not have access to such bonded goods in private stores except in the presence of the inspector, the act forbidding the importer "access to the goods except in the presence of the proper officer of the customs." The expense of furnishing such inspectors for private stores, should, of course, be borne by the importers, for whose convenience and benefit this arrangement is made, and who can only exhibit the goods or withdraw packages for sale or reëxportation from time to time under the law, "in the presence of" an inspector. After much deliberation and inquiry my mind has been brought to the conclusion, that this expense could best be arranged by an equitable apportionment of the compensation paid to inspectors, to be refunded by such importers; the amount to be fixed in each case by the collector, with the approbation of the Secretary of the Treasury, or by adopting the principle of half storage, with a view to cover the expense, which has operated so well in some of the ports, leaving to the importer the option between these two modes of payment; and this is the principle upon which the present instructions are based. Under the law, however, as it now stands, in our largest |