Authorizing the Secretary of Commerce and Police to Establish Harbor Lines Where He Deems It Necessary

January 9, 1903

ACT NO. 592

AN ACT AUTHORIZING THE SECRETARY OF COMMERCE AND POLICE TO ESTABLISH HARBOR LINES WHERE HE DEEMS IT NECESSARY ON THE SHORES OF HARBORS, BAYS, AND NAVIGABLE LAKES OR RIVERS OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, AND TO APPOINT A COMMISSION FOR THE PURPOSE

SECTION 1. Where it is made manifest to the Secretary of Commerce and Police that the establishment of harbor lines is essential to the preservation and protection of harbors, bays, and navigable lakes or rivers, he is hereby authorized to cause such lines to be established, beyond which no piers, wharves, bulkheads, or other works shall be extended or deposits made, except under such regulations as may be prescribed from time to time by him: Provided, That whenever the Secretary of Commerce and Police grants to any person or persons permission to extend piers, wharves, bulkheads, or other works, or to make deposits in any harbor, bay, or navigable lake or river of the Philippine Islands, beyond any harbor lines established by authority of the Insular Government, he shall cause to be ascertained the amount of tide water to be displaced by any such structure or any such deposits, and he shall, if he deem it necessary, require the parties to whom the permission is given to make compensation for such displacement either by excavating in some part of the harbor, including the tide-water channels between high and low water marks, to such an extent as to create a basin for as much tide water as may be displaced by such structure or by such deposits, or in any other mode that may be satisfactory to him.

SECTION 2. In the establishment of harbor lines for any harbor, bay, or navigable lake or river of the Philippine Islands under this Act, the Secretary of Commerce and Police is authorized to appoint a commission to recommend to him the proper harbor lines. Said commission is authorized to employ, for a reasonable sum to be approved by the Secretary of Commerce and Police, such surveyors as may be needed to run the lines, the compensation to be paid out of the Insular Treasury upon proper appropriation. The Consulting Engineer to the Commission shall be ex officio a member of such commission, and the chief engineer in charge of the improvement of any port in the Islands shall be ex officio a member of any port in the Islands shall be ex officio a member of such commission when the harbor lines are to be run in such port. The other member of the commission shall be an officer of the Insular Government designated by the Secretary of Commerce and Police. It shall be the duty of the commission to supervise the necessary survey of the harbor lines, to agree upon the proper lines to be adopted, and to recommend the same to the Secretary of Commerce and Police for his approval.

SECTION 3. The commission shall also adopt regulations with respect to the construction of piers, wharves, bulkheads, and other works and with respect to deposits which may be made, which shall be submitted to the Secretary of Commerce and Police for his modification or approval, and when approved by him the regulations shall govern the construction of such piers, wharves, bulkheads, and other works, and the manner and amount of deposits.

SECTION 4. The public good requiring the speedy enactment of this bill, the passage of the same is hereby expedited in accordance with section two of An Act prescribing the order of procedure by the Commission in the enactment of laws," passed September twenty-sixth, nineteen hundred.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect on its passage.

ENACTED, January 9, 1903.