The Federal System. 
143 
varied according to the tonnage. For ships of less than one 
hundred tons, the fee was one dollar and a half, while all ships 
of over one hundred tons were required to pay two dollars. 
Payments were also made for permits to land goods 1 2 and for 
each bond procured. In 1789 the coasting and fishing trades 
were put under special regulation ,J by means of licenses, for 
each of which a fee of fifty cents was collected; and in addition 
a fee of ten dollars was charged for each certificate of enroll¬ 
ment. Foreign vessels were placed under similar restrictions 
and compelled to pay for any privileges granted them. This 
schedule of fees continued in force for two decades, 3 when it was 
decided to vary the amount according to the importance of the 
port of entry, and a salary was added to the fees of office in 
some of the Northern and Northwestern ports. A decade later, 
in 1831, an act was passed which required all the fees collected 
in the Northern custom-houses to be paid into the treasury, and 
placed the customs officials of that section on a salary. Up 
to 1864 most custom house officials of the Atlantic sea-board 
received as compensation all the fees collected at their respective 
offices. The enormous sums which some of these positions 
yielded finally became known, and as a result Congress passed 
an act 4 making $9,500 the maximum amount which any collec¬ 
tor should be allowed to retain, and providing that any excess 
above this amount should be paid into the treasury. These pro¬ 
visions, however, did not prove satisfactory. So in 1879 a new 
law was enacted which provided a schedule of fees to be exacted 
from all who had dealings with the customs service. These 
multitudes of fees, consisting usually in small vexatious exac¬ 
tions, were in many cases inadequate to compensate the officers 
concerned, except in the busy ports where they aggregated 
enormous sums. One of the sections 5 of the last named act pro¬ 
vided fixed salaries for naval officers, collectors, and surveyors 
of the chief ports. There was no reason why this provision 
1 In 1887 the fee for each permit was twenty cents. 
2 Revised Statutes , U. S., I, 704. 
3 Ibid., Ch. 107, par. 7, 1822. 
4 Ibid., XIII, 134. 
5 Section 23. 
