Enclosed you will find two dollars, which please place in
the National Treasury, as it should be there by rights. Some
time ago I made a purchase of an article and evaded paying
duty when the custom-house official came around. My
conscience has hurt me sorely, and I desire to pay the
government, and know of no better way than by sending it to
you. I am very sorry indeed to trouble you, but please help
me out of my trouble by giving the money to Uncle Sam, and
you will have the thanks and gratitude of one who is
penitent.
Prosperity Stirs the Conscience.
The sincerity displayed in all the letters is unmistakable. A few years
ago many of the communications revealed a strong religious feeling. During
the present period of prosperity contributions have been increasing, and
it is now the opinion of some officials that many of these penitents have
long been anxious to restore "to Caesar the things that are Caesar's," but
that they waited until they were better able to do so.
A few weeks ago a man wrote from Kansas, stating that thirty-six years
before he bought a horse from army deserters, who had stolen it from Fort
Leavenworth. He paid them forty dollars for the animal, and not long
afterward sold it for the same sum. He therefore made nothing out of the
transaction, but the fact that he had dealt in a contraband horse had
preyed steadily, he said, upon his conscience, and after the lapse of a
generation he sent forty dollars to the Conscience Fund.
Just how much smuggling is carried on is a matter of interesting
speculation. Last year our registered imports amounted in value to over
one billion dollars. The dutiable goods amounted to considerably more than
half this sum, and the duties collected aggregated no less than two
hundred and seventy-seven million dollars.
In the latter part of 1905 a farmer in Michigan sent in thirty dollars as
the duty which he should have paid on a horse driven across the Canadian
border from Manitoba a number of years ago. This was duly credited to the
Conscience Fund, and nearly a month later a second letter was received
from the same penitent farmer, saying that he had decided also to pay duty
on the harness (valued at seven dollars) which the horse wore and the
buggy (valued at ten dollars) it hauled on the occasion of its journey
across the border from Manitoba. In the second letter he enclosed six
dollars and sixty-five cents for the Conscience Fund.
When John G. Carlisle was Secretary of the Treasury he received the
following letter with forty dollars enclosed: