The master of any fishing vessel who shall not keep his Sec. 5. implements or nets at a distance of at least one nautical mile from a vessel engaged in laying or repairing a cable; or the master of any fishing vessel who shall not keep his implements or nets at a distance of at least a quarter of a nautical mile from a buoy or buoys intended to mark the position of a cable when being laid or when out of order or broken, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction thereof, shall be liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten days, or to a fine not exceeding two hundred and fifty dollars, or to both such fine and imprisonment, at the discretion of the court: Provided, however, That fishing vessels, on perceiving or being able to perceive the said signals displayed on a telegraph ship, shall be allowed such time as may be necessary to obey the notice thus given, not exceeding twenty-four hours, during which period no obstacles shall be placed in the way of their operations. For the purpose of carrying into effect the convention, a Sec. 6. person commanding a ship of war of the United States or of any foreign state for the time being bound by the convention, or a ship specially commissioned by the Government of the United States or by the Government of such foreign state, may exercise and perform the duties vested in and imposed on such officer by the convention. Any person having the custody of the papers necessary for the preparation of the statements provided for in article ten of the convention who shall refuse to exhibit them or shall violently resist persons having authority according to article ten of said convention to draw up statements of facts in the exercise of their functions, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction thereof shall be liable to imprisonment not exceeding two years, or to a fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, or to both fine and imprisonment, at the discretion of the court. The penalties provided in this act for the breaking or injury of a submarine cable shall not be a bar to a suit for damages on account of such breaking or injury. When an offense against this act shall have been committed by means of a vessel, or of any boat belonging to a vessel, the master of such vessel shall, unless some other person is shown to have been in charge of and navigating such vessel or boat, be deemed to have been in charge of and navigating the same, and be liable to be punished accordingly. Sec. 7. Sec. 8. Sec. 9. Unless the context of this act otherwise requires, the Sec. 10. term "vessel" shall be taken to mean every description of vessel used in navigation, in whatever way it is propelled; the term "master" shall be taken to include every person having command or charge of a vessel; and the term "person" to include a body of persons, corporate or incorporate. The term "convention" shall be taken to mean the International Convention for the Protection of Submarine Sec. 11. Sec. 12. Sec. 13. Cables, made at Paris on the fourteenth day of May, eighteen hundred and eighty-four, and proclaimed by the President of the United States on the twenty-second day of May, eighteen hundred and eighty-five. The provisions of the Revised Statutes, from section forty-three hundred to section forty-three hundred and five, inclusive, for the summary trial of offenses against the navigation laws of the United States, shall extend to the trial of offenses against the provisions of sections four and five of this act. The provisions of this act shall be held to apply only to cables to which the convention for the time being applies. The district courts of the United States shall have jurisdiction over all offenses against this act and of all suits of a civil nature arising thereunder, whether the infraction complained of shall have been committed within the territorial waters of the United States or outside of the said waters: Provided, That in case such infraction in committed outside of the territorial waters of the United States the vessel on board of which it has been committed is a vessel of the United States. From the decrees and judgments of the district courts in actions and suits arising under this act appeals and writs of error shall be allowed as now provided by law in other cases. Criminal actions and proceedings for a violation of the provisions of this act shall be commenced and prosecuted in the district court for the district within which the offense was committed, and when not committed within any judicial district, then in the district court for the district within which the offender may be found; and suits of a civil nature may be commenced in the district court for any district within which the defendant may be found and shall be served with process. There shall be at the seat of government an executive Feb. 14, 1903. department to be known as the Department of Commerce and Labor, and a Secretary of Commerce and Labor, who shall be the head thereof, who shall be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, who shall receive a salary of eight thousand dollars per annum, and whose term and tenure of office shall be like that of the heads of the other Executive Departments; and section one hundred and fifty-eight of the Revised Statutes is hereby amended to include such Department, and the provisions of title four of the Revised Statutes, including all amendments thereto, are hereby made applicable to said Department. The said Secretary shall cause a seal of office to be made for the said Department of such device as the President shall approve, and judicial notice shall be taken of the said seal. There shall be in said Department an Assistant Secre- Sec. 2. tary of Commerce and Labor, to be appointed by the President, who shall receive a salary of five thousand dollars a year. He shall perform such duties as shall be prescribed by the Secretary or required by law. There shall also be one chief clerk and a disbursing clerk and such other clerical assistants as may from time to time be authorized by Congress; and the Auditor for the State and other Departments shall receive and examine all accounts of salaries and incidental expenses of the office of the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, and of all bureaus and offices under his direction, all accounts relating to the LightHouse Board, Steamboat-Inspection Service, Immigration, Navigation, Alaskan fur-seal fisheries, the National Bureau of Standards, Coast and Geodetic Survey, Census, Department of Labor, Fish Commission and to all other business Sec. 3. Sec. 4. within the jurisdiction of the Department of Commerce and Labor, and certify the balances arising thereon to the Division of Bookkeeping and Warrants and send forthwith a copy of each certificate to the Secretary of Commerce. and Labor. It shall be the province and duty of said Department to foster, promote, and develop the foreign and domestic commerce, the mining, manufacturing, shipping, and fishery industries, the labor interests, and the transportation facilities of the United States; and to this end it shall be vested with jurisdiction and control of the departments, bureaus, offices, and branches of the public service hereinafter specified, and with such other powers and duties as may be prescribed by law. All unexpended appropriations, which shall be available at the time when this Act takes effect, in relation to the various offices, bureaus, divisions, and other branches of the public service, which shall, by this Act, be transferred to or included in the Department of Commerce and Labor, or which may hereafter, in accordance with the provisions of this Act, be so transferred, shall become available, from the time of such transfer, for expenditure in and by the Department of Commerce and Labor and shall be treated the same as though said branches of the public service had been directly named in the laws making said appropriations as parts of the Department of Commerce and Labor, under the direction of the Secretary of said Department. The following-named offices, bureaus, divisions, and branches of the public service, now and heretofore under the jurisdiction of the Department of the Treasury, and all that pertains to the same, known as the Light-House Board, the Light-House Establishment, the SteamboatInspection Service, the Bureau of Navigation, the United States Shipping Commissioners, the National Bureau of Standards, the Coast and Geodetic Survey, the Commissioner-General of Immigration, the commissioners of immigration, the Bureau of Immigration, the immigration service at large, and the Bureau of Statistics, be, and the same hereby are, transferred from the Department of the Treasury to the Department of Commerce and Labor, and the same shall hereafter remain under the jurisdiction and supervision of the last-named Department; and that the Census Office, and all that pertains to the same, be, and the same hereby is, transferred from the Department of the Interior to the Department of Commerce and Labor, to remain henceforth under the jurisdiction of the latter; that the Department of Labor, the Fish Commission, and the Office of Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries, and all that pertains to the same, be, and the same hereby are, placed under the jurisdiction and made a part of the Department of Commerce and Labor; that the Bureau of Foreign Commerce, now in the Department of State, be, and the same hereby is, transferred to the Department of Commerce and Labor and consolidated with and made a part of the Bureau of Statistics, hereinbefore transferred from the The official records and papers now on file in and pertaining exclusively to the business of any bureau, office, department, or branch of the public service in this Act transferred to the Department of Commerce and Labor, together with the furniture now in use in such bureau, office, department, or branch of the public service, shall be, and hereby are, transferred to the Department of Commerce and Labor. * * * * And all consular officers of the United States, including consuls-general, consuls, and commercial agents, are hereby required, and it is made a part of their duty, under the direction of the Secretary of State, to gather and compile, from time to time, useful and material information and statistics in respect to the subjects enumerated in section three of this Act in the countries and places to which such consular officers are accredited, and to send, under the direction of the Secretary of State, reports as often as required by the Secretary of Commerce and Labor of the information and statistics thus gathered and compiled, such reports to be transmitted through the State Department to the Secretary of the Department of Commerce and Labor. Sec. 5 The jurisdiction, supervision and control now possessed Sec.7. and exercised by the Department of the Treasury over the fur-seal, salmon and other fisheries of Alaska and over the immigration of aliens into the United States, its waters, territories and any place subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are hereby transferred and vested in the Department of Commerce and Labor: Provided, That nothing contained in this Act shall be construed to alter the method of collecting and accounting for the head-tax prescribed by section one of the Act entitled "An Act to regulate immigration," approved August third, eighteen hundred and 14317-03- -28 |