to receive, and carefully to preserve, the same: and the marshals, respectively, shall, on or before the first day of February, in the year one thousand eight hundred and thirty-one, transmit to the Secretary of State, one copy of the several returns received from each assistant, and, also, the aggregate amount of each description of persons within their respective districts or territories; and every marshal failing to file the returns of his assistants, or the returns of any of them, with the clerks of the respective courts, as aforesaid, or failing to return one copy of the several returns received from each assistant, and, also, the aggregate amount of each description of persons, in their respective districts or territories, as required by this act, and as the same shall appear from said returns, to the Secretary of State, within the time limited by this act, shall, for every such offence, forfeit the sum of one thousand dollars; which forfeiture shall be recoverable in the courts of the districts or territories where the said offences shall be committed, or within the circuit courts held within the same, by action of debt, information, or indictment; the one half thereof to the use of the United States, and the other half to the informer; but, where the prosecution shall be first instituted on behalf of the United States, the whole shall accrue to their use;United States judges to give this act in charge to grand juries, &c.
Clerks of courts to transmit to Dept. of State, the returns, &c. and, for the more effectual discovery of such offences, the judges of the several district courts, in the several districts, and of the Supreme Courts in the territories of the United States, as aforesaid, at their next session, to be held after the expiration of the time allowed for making the returns of the enumeration, hereby directed, to the Secretary of State, shall give this act in charge to the grand juries, in their respective courts, and shall cause the returns of the several assistants, and the said attested copy of the aggregate amount, to be laid before them for their inspection. And the respective clerks of the said courts shall, within thirty days after the said original returns shall have been laid before the grand juries aforesaid, transmit and deliver all such original returns, so filed, to the Department of State.
Proviso. from the dispersed situation of the inhabitants, in some divisions, one dollar and twenty-five cents will not be sufficient for one hundred persons, the marshals, with the approbation of the judges of their respective districts or territories, may make such further allowance to the assistants, in such divisions, as shall be deemed an adequate compensation; Provided, The same does not exceed one dollar and seventy-five cents for every fifty persons by them returned: Provided, further,Proviso: Oath to be taken by assistants, before receiving compensation. That, before any assistant, as aforesaid, shall in any case, be entitled to receive said compensation, he shall take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation, before some judge or justice of the peace, authorized to administer the same,to wit: “I, A. B., do solemnly swear (or affirm) that the number of persons set forth in the return made by me, agreeably to the provisions of the act, entitled ‘An act to provide for taking the fifth census or enumeration of the inhabitants of the United States,’ have been ascertained by an actual inquiry at every dwelling-house, or a personal inquiry of the head of every family, in exact conformity with the provisions of said act; and that I have, in every respect, fulfilled the duties required of my by said act, to the best of my abilities; and that the return aforesaid is correct and true, according to the best of my knowledge and belief.” The compensation of the several marshals shall be as follows:
