162 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 194 



witli the partial uniformity of which it is susceptible at present, 

 excluding all innovations. To consult with foreign nations for the 

 future and ultimate establishment of universal and permanent uni- 

 formity." Prophetic words 1 Not yet has the goal been reached. 



In 1830 the Treasury Department, which was charged with tlie 

 collection of customs, was instructed through a resolution of the 

 Senate to investigate the weights and measures in use in the various 

 customs houses of the country, with a view to bringing about uni- 

 formity in the collection of customs. The Secretary of the Treasury 

 gave a broad interpretation to this authority to "investigate," and 

 the outcome was that the various customs offices were supplied, with- 

 out further action by Congress, with uniform sets of weights and 

 measures. These included an avoirdupois pound of 7,000 grains, 

 and a yard of 36 inches, based upon standards which Hassler, the 

 first Superintendent of the Coast and Geodetic Survey, had obtained 

 in England. 



So well pleased was Congress with this solution of its difficulties 

 that the Secretary of the Treasury in 1836 was directed through a 

 joint resolution to deliver to the Governor of each State a complete 

 set of all the weights and measures used by the Treasury Depart- 

 ment in the collection of customs. Although no congressional action 

 was taken to legalize these standards, a number of the States adopted 

 them independently, and a groundwork for uniform weights and 

 measures was at last provided. 



It was not until after the Civil War that Congress took the first 

 formal step to legalize a system of weights and measures, and this 

 oddly enough did not relate to the weights and measures in common 

 use, but to the metric system, rejected in 1795. The act of 1866 

 reads as follows: 



It shall be lawful throughout the United States of America to employ the 

 weights and measures of the metric system ; and no contract or dealing or 

 pleading in any court shall be deemed invalid, or liable to objection, because 

 the weights or measures expressed or referred to therein are weights or 

 measures of the metric system. 



We have thus the anomalous situation in this country of a legalized 

 system of metric weights and measures which is used for scientific 

 purposes, and a customary system of weights and measures which 

 is in common use but has never been formally legalized. Wlien Con- 

 gress passed the Metric Act in 1866, it realized that the country had 

 no metric standards and accordingly included the approximate equiva- 

 lents of the metric system in English measure. The length of the 

 meter was defined in inches, even though the length of the inch 

 had never been "fixed." That Congress had in mind only an approxi- 

 mation to the true ratio of the units in the two systems is evident 



