Copy of the order in Council of the 14th May, 1783, left by Mr. Hartley with the American Ministers the 21st May, 1783.
At the Court of St. James, 14th May, 1783.
Present
Whereas, by an Act of parliament passed this session entitled “An Act for preventing certain instruments from being required from Ships belonging to the United States of America, & to give to his Majesty for a limited time, certain powers of carrying on trade and Commerce, between the Subjects of his Majesty’s dominions and the Inhabitants of the said United States.” It is among other things enacted, that during the continuance of the said Act, it shall and may be lawful for his Majesty in Council, by order or orders to be issued and published from time to time, to give such directions and to make such regulations with respect to duties, drawbacks or otherwise for carrying on the trade and Commerce between the people & territories belonging to the Crown of Great Britain and the People and territories of the said United States, as to his Majesty in Council shall appear most expedient and salutary any Law, usage or custom to the contrary notwithstanding; His Majesty doth therefore by and with the advice of his privy Council hereby order and direct, that Oil or any unmanufactoried goods or merchandizes being the growth or production of any of the territories of the said United States of America may (until further order) be imported directly from thence into any of the port of this Kingdom, either in British or American Ships, by British Subjects or by any of the people inhabiting in & belonging to the said United States or any of them and such goods and Merchandizes shall and may be entered & landed in any port of this Kingdom upon payment of the same duties as the like sort of goods are and may be subject and liable to, if imported by British Subjects, in British Ships from any British Island or plantation in America, and no other, notwithstanding such goods or merchandizes, or the Ships in which the same may be brought, may not be accompanied with the certificates or other documents heretofore required by Law. And it is hereby further ordered & directed, that there shall be the same drawbacks, exemptions
and bounties on merchandizes and goods exported from Great Britain into the territories of the United States of America or any of them, as are allowed upon the exportation of the like goods or Merchandizes to any of the Islands, plantations, or Colonies belonging to the Crown of Great Britain in America; and it is hereby further ordered and directed, that all American Ships & Vessels which shall voluntarily come into any port of Great Britain since the 20th January, 1783, shall be admitted to an entry, and after such entry made, shall be entitled together with the goods and merchandizes on board the same ships and Vessels to the full benefits of this order, and the right honorable the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty’s Treasury and the Lord Commissioners of the Admiralty are to give the necessary directions therein, as to them may respectively appertain.