THE BALANCE OF TRADE. The present high rates obtained for gold and exchange is thus referred to, and in a measure accounted for by the Journal of Commerce: "The total imports of foreign merchandise at New York from January 1st to the close of last week amounted to $138,105,422 as per Customhouse value, while the exports for the same time amounted to $109,518,220 in produce, and $43,556,214 in specie, making a total of $153,074,434 in exports against only $138,000,000 in imports. If the other ports taken together give an equal amount of imports and exports, so that the balance of trade is left for this port to settle, it will be seen that there is about $15,000,000 in our favor. If this were the true balance, and no other causes interfered, there could be no reason for an active demand for bills of exchange at a rate so far above the value of our paper currency. It is evident, therefore, that there is a large balance still to be remitted for on the other side. "What then is this balance and how does it arise? We answer that a portion of it comes from the fact that there is now a legal undervaluation of foreign imports at the Custom-house. The appraisers are bound to fix the dutiable value of goods at the port of shipment, but this may not represent their cost as compared with our currency. Thus, a pair of blankets may be worth in England one pound sterling, and the appraisers agree with the importer in establishing that as the dutiable value. But how much is one pound sterling in federal currency? It is actually at present about $6.12 in our paper money; but according to law it is only $4.84, so that the returns of imports, being made by this arbitrary standard, are partly below the amount to be paid for the goods received, even exclusive of profits." Such is undoubtedly a correct explanation; and when we take into the account the return of stocks held abroad, and the transmission from this country by the timid, of funds for deposit or investment in Europe, we will readily see sufficient cause for our being so largely in debt to Europe. BANK OF ENGLAND-ACCESS TO THEIR BULLION ROOM. A correspondent of the Birmingham Post tells the following strange story: "The directors of the Bank of England received recently an anonymous letter, stating that the writer had the means of access to their bullion room. They treated the matter as a hoax, and took no notice of the letter. Another more urgent and specific letter failed to rouse them. At length the writer offered to meet them in the bullion room at any hour they pleased to name. They then communicated with their correspondent through the channel he had indicated, appointing some dark and midnight hour for the rendezvous. A deputation from the board repaired to the bullion room, locked themselves in, and waited the arrival of the mysterious correspondent. Punctual to the hour a noise was heard below. Some boards in the floor were without much trouble displaced, and in a few minutes the Guy Fawkes of the bank stood in the midst of the astonished directors. An old drain ran under the bullion room, the existence of which had become known to him, and by means of which he might have carried away enormous sums. Nothing had been abstracted, and the directors rewarded the honesty and ingenuity of their anonymous correspondent a working man-by a present of £300. COMMERCIAL REGULATIONS. 1. IMPORTANT INSTRUCTIONS TO THE COLLECTORS. 2. DECISIONS ON THE TAX LAW. 3. REAL ESTATE SALES AND THE TAX LAW. 4. BANKS MUST TAKE OUT BROKERS' LICENSE TO DEAL IN EXCHANGE. 5. TAX LAW-RECTIFIED SPIRITS, ETO. 6. STAMP DUTY ON BOND AND MORTGAGE 7. STAMPS ON CHECKS AND DRAFTS MUST BE CANCELED BY THE DRAWER. 8. DUTIES ON IMPORTS IN VENEZUELA. IMPORTANT INSTRUCTIONS TO THE COLLECTORS. THE collectors appointed under the recent act of Congress, to collect the national tax, are making their arrangements and will soon commence operations. The Commissioner of Revenue at Washington has just issued the following important regulations to the collectors at Philadelphia, which apply equally to collectors elsewhere: 1. All mechanics, except those who merely do repairs, must be registered as manufacturers, and must take out a license as such if their annual sales amount to $1,000. 2. But mechanics and other manufacturers who sell their own manufactures at the place where they are produced are not required to take out an additional license as traders. This does not include rectifiers, who must pay both licenses. 3. If manufacturers have an office, depot, store-room, or agency, at a place different from the place where the goods are made, or if they sell the manufactures of others, in addition to their own, they must pay a traders' as well as a manufacturers' license. Thus, a tobacconist who both makes cigars and keeps for sale goods in his line which he has purchased must take out both licenses. So must a druggist, who also makes patent articles, or medicines, &c., for which he has a private formula or receipt. 4. Persons keeping bar-rooms or saloons for the sale of liquors must take out a liquor dealers' license. If they also furnish food, they must, in addition, take out an eating-house license; and the sale of cigars, &c., requires a tobacconist's or retail dealer's license beside. Billiard tables require a special license, and bagatelle tables are reckoned as billiards. 5. Commission merchants, who are also ship or commercial brokers, are required to take out two licenses. 6. Grocers selling flour by the barrel, or salt by the sack, or any other article in the original package, are reckoned as wholesale dealers. 7. Stamps must be attached to the papers requiring them, at the time of their execution, and must be obliterated by the person writing his initials upon them. Telegraphic dispatches must be stamped and effaced when delivered to be transmitted. But railroad and telegraph companies are not required to stamp their own dispatches over their own lines. 8. Arrangements will be made with the collector of this district to supply stamps to parties desiring to purchase $50 worth or over, at the rates of discount established by the Treasury Department. 9. Notes and bills of exchange drawn for a certain sum, with interest, will be stamped according to the principal sum. Foreign currency will be estimated at the real par of exchange; the pound sterling, for instance, at the rate fixed for sovereigns, not at the nominal rate of $4 43, nor at the market rate of exchange, which is now something above the real par. 10. On and after October 1st the following instruments must be stamped: All agreements, appraisements, checks, sight drafts, promissory notes, inland and foreign bills of exchange, bills of lading to foreign ports, packages, &c., per express, bonds, certificates of stock, or profit, of deposit in banks, of damages, and all other certificates, charter parties, brokers, memorandums, conveyances, mortgages, leases, telegraph dispatches, custom house entries and manifests, policies of insurance--life, marine and fire, and renewals of same--passage tickets to foreign ports, powers of attorney, proxies, probate of wills, protest, warehouse receipts, and writs or other original process for commencing suit. Also, patent medicines, perfumeries, and playing cards. In reference to public houses and liquor dealers exclusively, it is defined that in a tavern or public house where liquor is sold licenses must be taken for each business, the license for the tavern to be according to the rental, and the license for liquor in all cases of retail to be twenty dollars. By retail is understood any quantity under three gallons. To sell above that quantity is wholesale, and the license is one hundred dollars. Restaurants which furnish bedding, and which keep liquors, are required to obtain three licenses-first a tavern license, secondly a license for the liquor bar, of twenty dollars, and thirdly a license for the eating bar, costing ten dollars, when the receipts amount to or exceed one thousand dollars per year. Eating houses are permitted to keep confectionery without an additional license. All dealers in liquor by retail are required to pay a license of twenty dollars per year. The penalty for refusal or failure to take out license is a fine of three times the amount of duty or tax imposed by the law, one-half of which goes to the informer. These taxes are, of course, in addition to the State and city licenses now imposed, and the accumulation of expenses will materially affect the smaller dealers who abound in every part of the city. The prosecution of delinquents is made imperative on the collectors, who hold the names and residences of all dealers, so that escape from the penalty is next to impossible. DECISIONS ON THE TAX LAW. Treasury Department, Office of Internal Revenue, GENTLEMEN:-I have received your letter of the 24th inst., and reply to the several inquiries made therein as follows: 1. Persons who manufacture articles which are exempt from ad valorem duty, are not subject to license tax as manufacturers. The provision in section sixty-six relating to manufacturers, does not apply to them, and they are to be licensed as wholesale or retail dealers, as the case may be. 2. Bankers, who, besides their regular business as defined in the first article of section sixty-four, do business as brokers, as defined in article thirteen of the same section, should be licensed both as bankers and brokers. 3. Two or more lawyers in actual and legal partnership, require but one license for such partnership. 4. Butchers and others who retail meat in market places or stores, should be licensed as retail dealers; if they sell their meat from carts, going from house to house, a peddler's license is required for each cart thus employed. 5. The excise law became operative, with respect to legacies and distributive shares of personal property, upon its passage, July 1st, 1862. 6. Any person whom the assessor deems proper, may have the custody of the assessor's lists during the fifteen days they are to be open for public inspection. 7. Rectifiers, as defined in article eight, section sixty-four, are not required to pay an ad valorem duty on their products; but do require license as dealers in liquor in order to sell. 8. For a full discussion of the questions relating to the duty on manufactures removed from the place of manufacture prior to Sept 1st, I refer you to the opinion of the Solicitor of the Treasury herewith enclosed. 9. Where brewers run a small still to dispose of spoiled beer, merely as an incident to their legitimate and proper business, I think a distiller's license is not necessary. 10. The law does not authorize the revenue officers to administer oaths, except as provided in sections forty-eight and fifty-two. I agree with you that they should be so authorized, and I think that Congress will amend the law in this particular. In some instances, State authorities have given assistants this power, by appointing them notaries or justices of the peace. 11. Inspectors must obtain the necessary instruments for their business, and charge accordingly in their fees for inspection. I do not know where they are to be obtained. 12. The printed instructions, No. 2, give all the information respecting collector's seals that appears necessary. 13. The same instructions contain the required information respecting drawback. I am, respectfully, Your obedient servant, GEO. S. BOUTWELL, Commissioner. To Messrs. A. P. STONE, Collector 7th District, Ohio, R. M. W. TAYLOR, Collector 2d District, C. S. HAMILTON, Assessor 8th District, Committee. REAL ESTATE SALES AND THE TAX LAW. The following correspondence in relation to the operation of the tax law upon real estate is important: No. 106 BROADWAY, N. Y., October 9. To the Hon. the Commissioner of Internal Revenue: SIR Referees have many sales of real estate under foreclosure proceedings where there is a prior mortgage upon the property and very often the amount bid is so much "over and above the prior mortgage," and in the referee's deed is inserted the amount of the bid, with the words, that "the property is conveyed subject to said prior mortgage." Supposing the fact to be that a referee sells a lot of ground for $6,500, subject to and over and above a prior mortgage of $5,000. The deed names $6,500 as the consideration money, and also contains an announcement that the property is sold subject to said prior mortgage of $5,000. Now I desire to know whether the stamp duty is to be paid on the amount of the bid only, (viz. $6,500,) or on the amount of the bid, including the mortgage, (viz. $11,500.) Again, by section seventy-six of the tax bill it is enacted that there shall be levied, collected, and paid on all sales of real estate at auction, a duty of 1.10 per centum on the gross amount of such sales— provided that no duty shall be levied under the provisions of this section upon any sales by judicial or executive officers making auction sales by virtue of a judgment or decree of any court. I desire to be informed First-Whether the duty is to be charged on the amount of the bid, or on the amount of the bid including amount of the prior mortgage. Second-Whether "referees " appointed by the court to sell in foreclosure or partition suits are considered by you as judicial or executive officers. By giving this your immediate attention you will much oblige Yours, respectfully, CHAS. H. HINNAU. Treasury Department, Ofice ng on, rnal Revenue, } Washington, October 13. You ask if a piece of SIR: Your letter of the 9th inst. is at hand. ground is sold subject to a mortgage on what amount must the stamp duty be paid. I answer, upon the amount of the consideration named in the deed-any fraud in naming the amount would invalidate the instrument. Your second inquiry upon sales of mortgaged real estate at auction is upon the same principle. The tax on the sale will only be required on the amount bid and paid over the mortgage. I ain of opinion that "referees" appointed by the court to sell in foreclosure or partition suits cannot be regarded as judicial or executive officers. GEO. S. BOUTWELL, Commissioner. Very respectfully, CHAS. H. HINNAU, Esq., 106 Broadway, N. Y. BANKS MUST TAKE OUT BROKERS' LICENSES TO DEAL IN EXCHANGE. The following correspondence between Messrs. ROCHESTER, bankers of Rochester, N. Y., and Commissioner BOUTWELL, settles the question as to the licenses required by bankers and brokers to enable them to transact business under the tax law: Office of John H. Rochester & Brother, Rochester } Hon. GEO. S. BOUTWELL, Commissioner of Internal Revenue, Washington, District of Columbia: DEAR SIR: In section 64 of the tax bill, clause 1, bankers are charged $300 license; in clause 13 brokers are charged $50, and in clause 15 land warrant brokers are charged $27. Is it intended that parties whose business includes all these branches shall pay for each license, or does the greater include the less, and is a person taking out a license as a banker, and paying $100 therefor, entitled to engage in the other branches of the business alluded to without paying for additional licenses? We ask these questions because we presume there is not a single banker and very in the country who is not also a broker, as defined by the tax bill, many of them are also land warrant brokers. 31 VOL. XLVII.-NO. V. |