ABSTRACT
The word Customs is exceedingly old, and in ancient times applied to any " customary dues or payments. Its use came to be restricted to duties payable upon the exportation or importation of goods. The first customs duty of which we can trace the legislative origin was an export duty on wool and leather for war purposes, levied in the reign of Edward I. in 1297. Then came Tonnage and Poundage—the former levied at so much a ton on wine and the second at so much a pound of value on goods—and these came to be granted to each successive Sovereign at the beginning of his reign. The Tonnage and Poundage Act of 1660 (Charles II.), afterwards called the Old Subsidy, remained law until 1787, and between those dates so many duties and imposts were added that the complexity became bewildering. By 1785, when Pitt determined to reform the Customs, there were 68 different branches of the law. A single imported article paid not one but a dozen or more different duties, beginning with the old Poundage of 5 per cent. of 1660.
