Citizendia

Class overview
Operators: US Revenue Marine (later the Revenue Cutter Service)
In service: July 1791 - 1804
In commission: April 1791-1793 - 1792-1804
Completed: 10 (originally)
Active: None
General characteristics
Type: Revenue Marine cutters
Displacement: 35-55 tons
Length: ~50 ft
Beam: ~25 ft
Draught: ~ 6 ft 6 in
Propulsion: Sail
Armament: Muskets, pistols, swivel cannon on some


The first ten Revenue Service cutters were ten oceangoing vessels built at the behest of the first U.S. Congress in the early 1790s to crack down on smuggling. The United States Revenue Cutter Service was established by Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton in 1790 as an armed Maritime law enforcement The First United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government consisting of the United States Senate and the Smuggling, also known as trafficking, is the clandestine transportation of goods or persons past a point where prohibited such as out of a building into a Prison Since the U.S. Navy had at the time not yet been formed (it was established in 1798), these ten cutters of the newly formed Revenue Marine therefore represent the Federal Government's first official "armed force afloat",[1] as well as being the first seagoing vessels to operate with what would later become the U.S. Coast Guard. When used in a nautical sense a cutter is a small single-masted vessel Fore-and-aft rigged with two or more Headsails a Bowsprit, and The United States Revenue Cutter Service was established by Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton in 1790 as an armed Maritime law enforcement The federal government of the United States is the central United States Governmental body established by the United States Constitution.

Contents

Need for the Revenue Service

Immediately after the American Revolutionary War the brand-new United States of America was struggling to stay financially afloat. In this article the inhabitants of the thirteen colonies that supported the American Revolution are primarily referred to as "Americans" with occasional references to "Patriots" The United States of America —commonly referred to as the National income was desperately needed, and a great deal of this income came from import tariffs. For other uses of this word see Tariff (disambiguation. A tariff is a tax imposed on goods when they are moved across a political boundary Because of rampant smuggling, the need was immediate for strong enforcement of tariff laws, and on August 4, 1790 the United States Congress, urged on by Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, created the Revenue-Marine, later renamed Revenue Cutter Service in 1862. Smuggling, also known as trafficking, is the clandestine transportation of goods or persons past a point where prohibited such as out of a building into a Prison Events 70 - The Destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans. Year 1790 ( MDCCXC) was a Common year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year The United States Congress is the bicameral Legislature of the federal government of the United States of America, consisting of two houses The United States Secretary of the Treasury is the head of the United States Department of the Treasury, concerned with finance and monetary matters, and until The United States Revenue Cutter Service was established by Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton in 1790 as an armed Maritime law enforcement It would be the responsibility of the new Revenue-Marine to enforce the tariff and all other maritime laws.

Earlier revenue vessels

There were a number of vessels that served on an ad hoc basis as revenue boats in the period prior to Congress' authorization to build the ten cutters. Some were operated by the various states during the Confederation Period while others were operated by the federally appointed customs collectors in the ports after the formation of the government in 1789. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, also the Articles of Confederation was the governing Constitution of the alliance of thirteen independent and These "federal" revenue boats and craft varied in type and size, such as Philadelphia collector Sharp Delany's "barge with sails," that served before, during, and well after the General Green entered service in the waters around Philadelphia. Philadelphia (ˌfɪləˈdɛlfiə Operational history There is little or no information on her original design and unfortunately her monthly journals have not survived but some correspondence regarding her has particularly But such craft were not seagoing vessels capable of sailing well away from a protected harbor, as the cutters were specifically designed to do.

Duties of the Revenue cutters

Although little documentation exists regarding any of the first ten cutters' activities - most of the correspondence and logbooks from the era were destroyed by fire when the British Army burned Washington, D.C. (including the Treasury Department building in which these records were held; see image) during the War of 1812 and another fire in the Treasury Department in 1833 - these government vessels undoubtedly carried out a myriad of tasks. A Logbook was originally a book for recording readings from the log, and is used to determine the distance a ship traveled within a certain amount of time The British Army is the land armed forces branch of the British Armed Forces. Washington DC ( formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D The United States Department of the Treasury is a Cabinet department and the Treasury of the United States government. The War of 1812 was fought between the United States of America and the British Empire, particularly Great Britain and her North American colonies Many of these duties were spelled out in letters from the Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, to the various collectors of customs, who were in direct charge of the cutters and their crews. The United States Secretary of the Treasury is the head of the United States Department of the Treasury, concerned with finance and monetary matters, and until Customs is an Authority or agency in a Country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods The duties specifically assigned to the cutters and their crews as legislated by Congress and expounded by Hamilton included:

They were also tasked with a number of other duties that were not related to protecting the revenue. These included:

Their primary purpose, however, was to protect the revenue of the new nation by deterring smuggling. In business revenue or revenues is Income that a company receives from its normal business activities usually from the sale of goods and services That meant sailing out of the port to which they were assigned and intercepting vessels before they came too close to the shore. It was here, well out of the harbor but within sight of the coast, that smugglers unloaded part of their cargoes into smaller "coaster" vessels or directly onshore to avoid customs duties. Customs is an Authority or agency in a Country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods The collectors usually had smaller boats that could check vessels as they sailed into port. Therefore these ten cutters were not harbor vessels; they were designed to sail out to sea, survive in heavy weather, and sail swiftly so that they might overtake most merchant vessels. They were the nation's first line of defense against attempts to circumvent the new nation's duties, the country's major source of income during this period.

Footnotes

  1. ^ US Coast Guard historian's office

References

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