Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1909-06-18


ing the payment of something like $780,
600 in tariff duties, it is natural that pub
lie attention should be directed to the
practice of smuggling, which is as Old
as tariffs or imports, and which appears
to have reached its greatest perfection
in the United States. BY tampering with
the scales at the New York custom
house, the sugar trust succeeded in get
ting into the country, from 1910 to 1907,
duty-free merchandise on which there
should have been paid a tariff amounting
to million and a quarter of dollars. The
government claims that on account of the
device known as the seventeen holes and
the iron hook" it was defrauded on ship
ments of sugar reaching as far back as
1897 thus making the total unpaid duties
reach two millions and upwards. The
trust has made restitution of million
and a quarter, after suit, and criminal
prosecutions are to follow.
If the inventive faculty applied to dis
covering methods of evading customs du-
ties had been employed devising useful
appliances for the benefit of man, the in
dustrial and scientific progress of the race
would have been far greater Women are
born smugglers. The proverbial mystery
which surrounds the dress of a woman, in
so far as the masculine mind is con-
to carry out every plan she laid to evade
the customs officers with diamonds, jew
elry and laces, were it not that female
inspectors are employed at all the lead
ing ports. 1t is hard to make man
understand that smuggling is criminal,
and the customs people say that 1t is i'm
possible to bring the mind and conscience
of a woman to a realization of this fact.
The officials relate a story told by a
minister of the Disciples church, who had
a charge in a Maine town. He resided
with one of his parishioners, a widow,
who remarked to him one day that she
was going across the border to town
in Canada to purchase winter outfits for
her children The minister CHANGED to
meet her as she returned and, as she
did not carry any packages, was surprised
to hear her say that she had bought the
childrens clothing. His parishioner there
upon proceeded to show him her under
skirt in which there were a dozen pock-
cts, OF goodly size, containing suits for
all the children. and other things be-
sides The clergyman demonstrated with
his landladp for violating the law. 1T
is a man-made law" she replied. God
allows widows to buy where they can buy
the cheapest"
Several years ago little hunchbacked
man frosted down the gang-plank of
steamer at the New York docks. He was
a good-natured looking chap and several
customs inspectors who frequented the
races made bold to ask him to be allowed
to touch his hump, in order that they
might have good luck at the track the
following day. The anger and nervousness
displayed by the little man aroused the
suspicious of the officers, and they pro-
ceeded to search the afflicted stranger.
Indeed, they removed the hump, which was
found to consist of three porous plasters,
beneath which was tissue paper pack
age containing several hundred articles Of
jewelry, valued at thousands of dollars
The officers were never able to decide
whether the bowls of the smuggler while
the hump was being removed were due In
greater part to chagrin or physical pain
This man had made twenty-seven SNUG
Cling trips across the Atlantic, some
times employing one method of evading
the law and sometimes another.
It was charged that he had shipped the
body of his old mother from Europe, with
the coffin containing much jewelry on
which duty should have been paid, but he
Indignantly denied the charge. He said
that it was the body of his brother which
he had shipped, and confessed that he
had placed on the dead mans fingers for
ty-two rings which would have borne
thousands of dollars of revenue bad the
customs people found them.
One of the most celebrated smugglers
with whom the customs officials have
had to deal was a man named Lasar,
who, up to a few years ago, made the
evasion of customs laws his profession.
n
would meet him at Montreal when he
came over from Liverpool with smuggled
diamonds. She, too. wore petticoat of
many pockets, and in these she would
secrete the packages of stones and run
the gauntlet of the inspectors at the bor-
der Lasar struggled hundreds of thOus-
ands of dollars worth of diamonds, first
and last, selling them, it was proved, to
emnently respectable dealers in New
York.
He did not always employ a woman as
accomplice. On one occasion, while on
the deck of a steamer from Liverpool to
New York, he encountered a nurse maid
who was giving baby an airing. He az
fected to be much attracted to the child,
and the day before the steamer reached
New York gave the baby rattle. But
when the steamer had landed its passen-
gerSe, a customs Inspector ODS6TNSu La
sar exchanging the baby's rattle for an
other An examination of the toy which
Lasar had taken from the child showed
that it's rattle" was produced by many
thousand of dollars worth of diamonds.
On one trip across on a Montreal steam
err Lasar formed the acquaintance of
bridal couple from New York. and by the
time they had reached Montreal their ac'
uuaintance had ripened sufficiently to per-
NIT him to request the couple to deliver
certain packages to a man in New York
whose address he gave. He assured the
pair the articles were of little value and
not dutiable, but impressed upon them
the Importance of not allowing the Gus
toms inspectors at the border to see them,
as to do so might occasion delay and en-
barassment. The result was the pair
were taken into custody, owing probably
to their guilty appearance, and the groom
actually anguished in Jail for about
month before he could establish the fact
that he was only smuggler's victim and
not a guilty principal.
Some years ago the customs officers at
New York received a tip to the effect
that a certain man and his wife were en-
route to New York with diamonds. The
pair were questioned closely by the In
spectors when the steamer landed, but
it was impossible to elicit anything like
a confession. Finally, the two were sep
arated. and in a few minutes the wife