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(5) Provision was made to permit appeals, by persons directly interested or affected by any decision or action of the local inspectors, to be taken to the supervising inspector of the district, and from the decisions of the latter to the Supervising Inspector-General, whose judgment in all cases was to be final;

(6) Supervising inspectors were vested with power to investigate and decide questions in cases of disagreement between the members of local boards within their respective districts, and to review any decision or action of the same upon their own motion;

(7) The Supervising Inspector-General was given authority, in the same manner, to review any decision or action of either the supervising or local inspectors, and his decision, when approved by the Secretary of Commerce, was to be final;

(8) When necessary, reviewing officers were empowered to administer oaths and to summon and compel the attendance of witnesses by a similar process as that employed by the United States district courts;

(9) Additions to the personnel of the service were provided for, including boards of local inspectors and assistant inspectors. The Secretary of Commerce was given authority to appoint not to exceed four traveling inspectors for the improvement of the service, when in his judgment they might be necessary, and also a Deputy Supervising InspectorGeneral who was to be the chief clerk of the bureau and to act in the absence of the Supervising Inspector-General.19

(10) The activities of the service in regard to inspection were extended to include all steam-vessels owned or operated for determining the number of passengers that could be carried with safety was placed upon the local boards of inspectors. The effect of this amendment was to shift this responsibility in large measure to the supervising inspectors of the respective districts.

19 The service had had, prior to the passage of this act, a chief clerk who was acting Supervising Inspector-General in the absence of that officer. The effect of this act was to create the office of Deputy Supervising Inspector-General.

by the United States Shipping Board or any corporation organized or controlled by it;

(II) Cargo vessels documented under the laws of the United States were given permission to carry on board not to exceed sixteen persons in addition to their crew when navigating between any ports or places in the United States or its districts, territories, or possessions, or between any such port or place and any foreign port, or from any foreign port to another foreign port and such vessels should not be classed as "passenger vessels" within the meaning of the inspection laws. Such vessels were not exempted from regulations respecting life-saving equipment, however, and were required to give notice to such additional persons carried of the presence of dangerous articles on board or of any other condition or circumstance which would constitute a risk of safety for passenger or crew.20

Special mention should be made of the act approved March 4, 1915 (38 Stat. L., 1164), and known as the "Seamen's Act," which added materially to the work of the board of supervising inspectors and imposed a new activity upon the service. The board was charged with the establishment of rules and regulations, to be approved by the Secretary of Commerce, governing the number and character of life-saving appliances required by the law to be kept on board, and local inspectors were authorized to examine and grant cer

20 The above amendments and changes in the inspection laws are contained in the following acts: May 25, 1914 (38 Stat. L., 381); July 16, 1914 (38 Stat. L., 454); July 17, 1914 (38 Stat. L., 511); October 22, 1914 (38 Stat. L., 765); March 3, 1915 (38 Stat. L., 893); February 14, 1917 (39 Stat. L., 918); February 26, 1917 (39 Stat. L., 942); March 29, 1918 (40 Stat. L., 499); May 11, 1918 (40 Stat. L., 548); June 10, 1918 (40 Stat. L., 602); July 2, 1918 (40 Stat. L., 739); October 25, 1919 (41 Stat. L., 305); and June 5, 1920 (41 Stat. L., 988). By express provision in the act of 1920, known as the "Merchant Marine Act, 1920," rules and regulations made by or affecting the Steamboat-Inspection Service are excluded from the general grant of authority given to the Shipping Board to request departments, boards or bureaus to modify rules and regulations made by the latter affecting shipping in the foreign trade, and to approve new rules and regulations made by such departments, boards, or bureaus,

tificates of service to able seamen, such certificates to be accepted as prima facie evidence of the possessor's rating as an able seaman. Each local board was required to keep a complete record of all certificates of service thus issued, and to keep on file such affidavits as might be submitted by applicants. Boards of local inspectors were authorized by the Secretary of Commerce, following the passage of this act, to also issue certificates to persons qualified to serve as life-boat

men.

The history of the origin and development of the Steamboat-Inspection Service, which has been rapidly surveyed, necessarily has disclosed to a considerable degree the scope of the activities of the service, as it is functioning at the present time, and the progress made from time to time in improving and enlarging the organization of the service, since the historical development of any government bureau, such as the Steamboat-Inspection Service, is to be found only in the acts of Congress creating the service and enlarging the field of its work to meet new conditions and to increase the value of service it performs for the nation. In the remaining chapters of this monograph a more detailed and unified description of the present activities and organization of the service will be undertaken.

It is interesting to note, in passing, that the title "Steamboat-Inspection Service" is nowhere authorized by law. The present law governing the service, in defining the qualifications of the Supervising Inspector-General, says that he “shall be selected with reference to his fitness and ability to systematize and carry into effect all the provisions of law relating to the Steamboat-Inspection Service, and also provides that the Secretary of Commerce may detail assistant inspectors "as the needs of the Steamboat-Inspection Service may require." These two instances are the only references to the title made in the statutes. The Secretary of Commerce and the Supervising Inspector-General have suggested in their recent reports that because of the growth of the service beyond

the inspection of steam-vessels the title of the bureau should be changed. The latter, in his annual report for 1917, said in this connection: "The work of the service has also expanded in connection with the inspection of motor-boats, and hence the Department very properly suggested that the name of the service be changed from Steamboat-Inspection Service to Marine-Inspection Service, because the service touches in its activities not only the inspection of steamers but also the inspection of motor-boats and sailing vessels, and it has to do not only with the licensing of officers of steamers but also the licensing of officers of motor vessels and the certification of seamen and life-boat men."

CHAPTER II

ACTIVITIES

In the performance of its function, which is that of administering the laws of the United States enacted for the purpose of insuring that vessels are constructed, equipped, and manned in such a way as to afford the maximum degree of safety in their operation, the Steamboat-Inspection Service is at present engaged in a considerable number of specific activities-all directed toward minimizing the dangers and hazards of marine transportation. It is proposed, within the limits of this chapter, to present, in summary form, a survey of the activities of this service, noting the legal authorization for engaging in each particular type of work, and giving a description of the present methods employed by the service. No attempt will be made, however, to give a complete account of the provisions of law setting forth the specific requirements to which vessels subject to regulation must conform. These are, in many instances, technical in character and vary to a considerable degree according to the different types and sizes of vessels regulated. The same is true, to an even greater extent, of the rules and regulations established by the board of supervising inspectors to insure an efficient and uniform administration of the inspection laws, which, when approved by the Secretary of Commerce, have all the force and effect of law.

Before beginning a survey of the activities of the Steamboat-Inspection Service, no better explanatory statement concerning the general scope of those activities can be given than that of the Supervising Inspector-General in his annual report for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1911:

While the Steamboat-Inspection Service was organized, as

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