States, or owned by a citizen before the adoption of the federal constitution, or sold as prizes for a breach of the laws, and they must be owned wholly by citizens of the United States. The register may at any time be changed for an enrolment, or vice versa. § 12. Consuls are established in the different towns with which trade is carried on by American merchants, for their protection, and in order to facilitate and dispatch business. In the year 1813, when of course the powers of all the consuls in British ports were suspended by the war, there were forty-four American consuls in different ports. The consuls have a right to receive, in the places to which they are severally appointed, the protests or declarations, which such captains, masters, crews, passengers, and merchants, as are citizens of the United States may respectively chuse to make there; and also such as any foreigner may chuse to make before them, relative to the personal interest of any citizens of the United States. It is their duty, where the laws of the country permit, to take possession of the personal estate left by any citizen of the United States (other than seamen belonging to any ship or vessel who shall die within their consulate), leaving there no legal representative, partner in trade, or trustee to take care of his effects; to inventory the same, with the assistance of two merchants of the United States, or for want of them, of any others at their choice; to collect the debts due to the deceased in the country where he died, and pay the debts due from his estate which have been there contracted; to sell at auction, after reasonable public notice, such part of the estate as may be of a perishable nature, and such further part, if any, as may be necessary for the payment of his debts, and at the expiration of one year from his decease, the residue; and to transmit the balance of the estate to the treasury of the United States, to be holden in trust for the legal claimants. But if, at any time before such transmission, the legal representative of the deceased appear and demand his effects, they must deliver them up, after being paid their fees, and cease their proceedings. For the information of the representative of the deceased, it is the duty of the consul immediately to notify his death in one of the gazettes published in the consulate, and also to the secretary of state, that the same may be notified in the state to which the deceased belonged; and he must also, as soon as may be, transmit to the secretary of state, an inventory of the effects of the deceased. When vessels of the United States are stranded on the coasts of their consulates, it is the duty of the consuls, as far as the laws of the country will permit, to take proper measures, as well for the purpose of saving the vessels and cargoes, as for storing and securing the effects and merchandize saved, and for taking inventories thereof. But the consuls are not to take possession of the property when the master, owner, or consignee is present, or capable of taking possession of it; and should they not be present, it must be delivered to the owners, on demand, and payment of the expenses incurred. The consuls in the European and American ports receive no salaries, but are allowed certain fees, which are established by law. The consul at Algiers, however, is allowed a salary not exceeding four thousand dollars a year, and the consuls in the other Barbary states a salary not exceeding two thousand dollars a year. The salary of a minister plenipotentiary cannot exceed nine thousand dollars; that of a charge des affaires four thousand five hundred dollars; nor that of a secretary of legation or embassy, or secretary to a minister plenipotentiary, two thousand dollars per annum. Ministers plenipotentiary and charges des affaires, however, are allowed an outfit of an year's salary. Should any charge des affaires, secretary of legation or embassy, or secretary of a minister plenipotentiary, be appointed during the recess of the senate, and the appointment not be approved of by that body on its meeting, he is not entitled to any compensation*. * Act of May 1, 1810. CHAPTER VII. OF THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION. (In Continuation.) § 1. Revenues of the United States. § 2. The customs. § 3. The postoffice. § 4. Public lands. § 5. Receipts and expenditures from the commencement of the federal government. § 6. Public debt. § 7. Funding system. § 8. The sinking fund. § 9. Statement of the public debt in 1814. $10. The post-office establishment. § 11. Surveyor general's department and land-offices. § 12. The mint establishment. §13. United States coin. § 14. Trading-houses with the Indians. § 15. Indian intercourse. § 1. THE permanent revenue of the United States is derived from the proceeds of the customs, postage, and the sale of the public lands; to which are occasionally added, a direct tax on land with its improvements and slaves, and a variety of other internal taxes, such as taxes on distilled liquors, refined sugars, carriages, stamps, &c. §2. The most important branch of revenue is the customs, or duties on imports, which, from the commencement of the federal government till 1808, have been almost regularly and constantly increasing in amount. In 1792 the total proceeds from this source amounted only to $ 3,443,070 85; in 1808 they amounted to $ 16,363,550 58: the year 1792 has been taken, as they can hardly be said to have got into complete operation before that time. Since 1808 the decrease has been very considerable, owing to the hostile decrees of the European belligerents, the restraints imposed by our own government, and the war in which we are now involved. They still, however, amount to a very considerable sum. 3. The post-office first began to be productive of a revenue in 1793, in which year the profits amounted to rather more than eleven thousand dollars. The amount is very irregular, owing to the increase of post-offices which is constantly taking place, many of which are at first unproductive. 4. The public lands of the United States arise from the cessions of the right to back lands made to the union by Connecticut and the southern states, for the purpose of paying off the public debt, and from the purchase of Louisiana. The number of acres sold from the opening of the land-offices to October 1, 1812, was upwards of four millions, for which payments had been received at the treasury of upwards of six millions of dollars. The revenue derived from this source in the year 1811, was upwards of a million of dollars. The United States still hold about four hundred millions of acres, one half of which is in Louisiana, and the remainder in the state of Ohio, and in the different territories. 5. The receipts into the treasury from the commencement of the federal government to the 30th of September, 1812, have been The total of receipts will be $255,643,403 27 The expenditures of the United States during the same period, viz. from the commencement of the federal government to September 30, 1812, have been : For pay and subsistence of the army Fabrication of cannon, in 1802, 1803 38,572,575 15 3,493,758 96 263,611 54 Brought over 44,066,745 65 Indian department, viz. 822,838 68 430,298 84 Naval department Foreign intercourse, exclusive of Barbary powers, and including $ 6,361,000 paid under the convention with France of April 30, 1813, and with Great Britain of January 8, 1802 Barbary powers Civil list Miscellaneous civil 1,253,137 52 29,889,660 78 10,311,145 33 2,328,810 40 12,686,493 36 7,566,228 17 And the expenditures on account of the revolutionary government 316,268 70 253,280,750 58 2,362,652 69 The sum total of expenditures to Sep tember 30, 1812, is Which, with the balance in the treasury on that day Make the sum total of receipts as before stated $255,643,403 27 An explanation of a few of the items in the above statements will perhaps be useful to some readers. Under the head "miscellaneous," in the statement of receipts, is included a variety of articles, a few of which only will be mentioned. These are, fees on patents, sales of public property, salt works in the western country, fines, penalties, and forfeitures, &c. &c. The "bank stock," the sales of which constitute another item, consisted of five thousand shares of the stock of the bank of the United States, amounting, at four hundred dollars a share, to two millions of dollars. These shares government was authorized by the bank charter to subscribe for by borrowing the necessary funds from the bank, reimbursable in ten years by equal annual instalments. The profits arising from this transaction were, first, the difference between the dividends, which averaged eight per cent. per annum, and the interest paid |