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LETTER OF SUBMITTAL

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE,

BUREAU OF NAVIGATION,

Washington, July 1, 1927. SIR: l'he edition of the Navigation Laws for 1927 has been prepared in substantially the same form as the former editions, as these proved to be convenient for the use of collectors of customs, shipping commissioners, the masters, owners, and agents of vessels, seamen, and others directly interested in vessels, their officers, crews, passengers, and cargo.

Effort has been made to include in this volume only laws actually in force. Where sections of the Revised Statutes or other laws have been specifically repealed or amended by subsequent legislation the repealed portions of the law are omitted, and the present, not the original, reading of amended sections is adopted.

The effort has been made to confine the law included in this volume to the law relating to vessels, with which owners, masters, and agents should be acquainted. The line between this law and the customs law is not always clearly defined. The laws directly relating to duties on imports and to invoices are omitted, while those relating to entry, clearance, manifests, and transportation by water are included in this volume.

The scheme of arrangement will appear from the table of contents. The law has been divided into large divisions by subjects, called parts, while these parts have been subdivided into headed paragraphs.

For further convenience of reference a table of laws is published, giving the sections of the Revised Statutes and subsequent laws which have been included in this compilation, the date of enactment and amendment, together with the page of this compilation on which they may be found. The table of laws may be found at the end of the volume, together with the usual alphabetical index. Parenthetical references in italics at the conclusion of paragraphs give the number of section of the Revised Statutes included in each paragraph, or the date and section of the act, if enacted subsequent to the Revised Statutes, with the date of amendatory acts which have been incorporated, if practicable, in the paragraph. Where reference is made in a paragraph to a title or chapter of the Revised Statutes the numbers of the sections comprised in such title or chapter have been

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printed in brackets. Reference to the table of laws, at the end of the volume, will show which of those sections have been included in this volume as pertinent or in force, and will also show the page where they may be found. Fees, payable by the masters and owners of vessels of the United States, were in most instances abolished in 1886 and 1890, and accordingly the statutes imposing such fees are not retained in this compilation, though they furnish a basis on which officers are compensated from the Treasury for services.

The shipping act of 1916 and the merchant marine act of 1920 have been included intact as amended, with notations under the various subject heads which are repealed or amended by these acts.

The administrative provisions of the tariff act of 1922 which affect the navigation laws also have been segregated.

A. J. TYRER,

Commissioner. To Hon. HERBERT HOOVER,

Secretary of Commerce.