34 Vegetable Materials for Cordage, &fc, 



fibre of the " sun-plant" for rope makers ; and a question arose on 

 the duties to be charged on each. Mr. F. said that in importing 

 them., he had been influenced by the edition of the tariff law of 

 1828, republished in that year by two clerks of the custom house, 

 and revised by the late collector, in which the duty on coir rope, 

 is charged at 15 per cent, ad valorem ; and the "sun-plant" not 

 being mentioned at all, he concluded that the duty would be the same 

 as on the other " non-enumerated articles," viz. 15 per cent. It was 

 however determined to charge the coir at the same rate as that paid 

 by imported hempen cordage, viz. five cents per pound, and Mr. F. 

 accordingly paid that duty. Sometime after, another parcel of coir 

 rope was imported into Boston, and the owners resisting the attempt 

 to class it with foreign hempen cordage, the collector finally assented 

 to their construction of the tariff law. The extra duty, therefore, 

 which had been paid by Mr. F., amounting to seven hundred and 

 seventy five dollars, was refunded to him. With respect to the sun- 

 plant fibre, the question was, whether it should be charged whh the 

 duty of imported hemp, which was fifty dollars per ton, or be classed 

 with the non-enumerated articles, paying an ad valorem duty of 15 

 per cent, and which, in the case of the sun-plant fibre, would lower 

 the duty to nine dollars and ninety cents per ton. This last sum was 

 finally fixed on. The decision of the Boston collector as to the 

 coir, and that of the Philadelphia collector on the sun fibre, were 

 in strict accordance with justice, propriety and reason ; for the 

 framers of the tariff law of 1828, when fixing the high rates on im- 

 ported cordage and hemp, had alone in view, the hemp of Europe, 

 {Cannabis sativa,) and cordage made from it, never dreaming of any 

 other material for cordage than that yielded by this vegetable. The 

 officers of the customs, therefore, might with as much propriety have 

 classed a cargo of Paraguay tea (mate) with some of the varieties 

 of green or black tea of China, and charged the duty accordingly, 

 merely because the daily beverage is prepared for millions of peo- 

 ple in South America, from one of these vegetables, and from the 

 others in China, Europe and North America, as to equalize the duties 

 on two articles made from substances so opposite in their natures, as 

 the coco-nut husk strings and the hemp fibre. The same remark 

 is applicable to the hemp and sun-plant. It would have been quite 

 as imreasonable to charge at the same rate, two raw materials, such 

 as hemp and the fibres of the sun-plant, which are the produce of 



