EXAMINATIONS BY CUSTOMS’ OFFICERS.
The officers of Customs are compelled to discharge various duties beyond those connected with the collection and protection of the Revenue. Among others they have to take care that foreign goods, on their importation, do not bear the mark or brand of any British maker, or such marks or brands as would be likely to give them a British character. All goods so marked and branded are, by 16 and 17 Vict., cap. 107, sec. 44, prohibited to be imported into this country. Cases are constantly occurring where such goods have to be dealt with by the Customs’ authorities. In some instances the goods are confiscated, in others the brands or labels are ordered to be removed, upon which the goods are delivered to the owner, either with or without fine; and in other cases they are ordered to be returned to the port whence they were imported. But why should this duty devolve upon the Customs’ officers? It is an extremely disagreeable one, involving much trouble to the department and vexation to importers. If a manufacturer or dealer in this country infringes the right of another by using his mark or brand, he has his remedy in a court of justice; but he has no right to enter a factory or warehouse, to open packages and make an indiscriminate search, with or without grounds of suspicion that his brands have been placed on the contents of the packages. Yet, practically, this is really the case with regard to the Customs’ right of search for prohibited marks and brands. Why not let the goods pass without reference to brands or marks? Leave the owner of the marks to his remedy in law; and the vendor of the goods bearing such forged or false brands to the risk and penalty which he thus incurs. In this case the fraudulent dealer only will be the sufferer, while the innocent will be saved the vexation of having his goods pulled about at the Custom-house; and the Customs department will be relieved of an extremely disagreeable and troublesome duty. As to the brand, not those of any particular maker, but in their general character purporting the goods to be of British manufacture, but very little harm can result to any particular interest from the use of such marks. It will take something more substantial than such mere fictions to ruin the trade of the country; but if better goods, even if they be of foreign origin, can be obtained at the same prices as those paid for British, then so much the better for the consumer. Would it not be well, also, to relieve the Customs officers of the duty of searching for pirated works under the Copyright Act? Why not deal with the vendors here of such works, if reprinted abroad, in like manner as if reprinted here?