Business: Aspirin for Importers

The maze of U.S. customs laws, grown up haphazardly since George Washington signed the first tariff act in 1789, has compounded trivial annoyances into major headaches for American importers. Last week Congress provided some aspirin by passing a long-needed customs-simplification bill. The new bill will:

¶ Abolish penalties for undervaluation of imported articles. Under the old law, imports were dutiable at the value declared by the importer or the value placed on them by the Government’s appraiser, whichever was higher. If the importer underestimated the dutiable value, he had to pay a penalty; if he overestimated it, he paid duties on an unrealistically high valuation. Now, the final appraised value becomes the basis for duties, with no penalty if the estimate is too low.

¶ Eliminate special marking requirements (e.g., the rule that every imported knife must have etched or die-sunk into it the name of the manufacturer or importer, and the country of origin.

¶ Permit correction of clerical errors in importers’ statements without appeals to the customs courts, a process that often takes years.

¶ Abolish the annoying customs bonds now required of foreign tourists passing through the U.S. with dutiable articles worth $200 or less.

The Senate eliminated from the bill several important reforms proposed by the Administration (e.g., setting up a new yardstick for establishing the value of imported articles). But the Senate promised to consider these provisions again in the next session. Though the bill, as finally passed, was something less than the sweeping reform of U.S. customs laws importers wanted, it was a good start.