Definition
In trade and tariff law, "imported" describes goods or articles that have been brought or carried into a country from a foreign nation. An imported article is one that has crossed an international border and entered domestic territory from abroad. The term functions primarily as a modifier in customs, tariff, and trade statutes — identifying the status of goods as having originated outside the country and been introduced into it. Whether an article qualifies as "imported" for legal purposes can determine its taxability, regulatory treatment, admissibility, and eligibility for duties or exemptions under applicable trade law.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Simple past and past participle of "import" — as in goods brought into a country from abroad.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): To bring in from abroad; to introduce from a foreign or external source.
The common and legal meanings here are largely aligned, but the legal usage carries weight that the ordinary past tense does not. In tariff and customs law, "imported" is not merely a description of how something traveled — it is a legal status that attaches to goods and triggers specific statutory consequences, including duty obligations, regulatory inspection, and constitutional protections under the Import-Export Clause.
Common Confusion
"Imported" can be confused with goods that are merely in transit through a country, or with articles temporarily admitted under bond. Transit goods and goods admitted under temporary entry programs may not be legally "imported" in the tariff sense because they have not been formally entered for consumption or use in the domestic market. The legal act of importation is distinct from the physical act of carrying goods across a border.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in customs, trade, or constitutional law need to track how courts and statutes have defined the moment and manner of importation, because "imported" status is not simply a geographic fact — it is a legal conclusion. Under the U.S. Constitution's Import-Export Clause (Art. I, § 10), states are prohibited from laying imposts or duties on imports without congressional consent, making the classification of goods as "imported" a matter of constitutional significance, not just statutory administration.
Historical tariff statutes use "imported" as a threshold term: goods that qualify as imported fall within the tariff schedule; goods that do not (domestic goods, goods in transit, conditionally admitted goods) fall outside it. Researchers should watch for statutory definitions that modify the ordinary meaning — some tariff acts have defined "importation" to include or exclude specific circumstances, and these definitions do not always align across legislative periods.
In Bouvier's era, federal circuit and district courts were actively litigating what it meant for an article to be "imported" — whether the moment of entry, arrival in port, passage through customs, or some other act completed the legal status. The citation Bouvier provides (49 Fed. Rep. 99) points to this active interpretive work in the late nineteenth century. Researchers using historical tariff cases should verify whether the court's definition of "imported" reflects the operative statute at the time, since tariff schedules and their governing definitions changed frequently between the Civil War and the early twentieth century.
Cross-corpus researchers should also note the connection between "imported" as used in tariff law and "imports" as a constitutional category. The Supreme Court's jurisprudence on what constitutes an "import" for purposes of the Import-Export Clause adds a constitutional layer that purely statutory definitions do not capture.
Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's entry is brief but precise. It grounds the legal meaning directly in the Latin etymology — im porto, to bear or carry into — and confirms that in tariff law the word carries its plain meaning: an imported article is one brought into a country from abroad. Bouvier cross-references IMPORTS and IMPOSTS, signaling that the entry is best understood as part of a cluster of related customs and revenue terms rather than a standalone definition.
What Bouvier's entry does not address is the legal significance of the moment of importation, the distinction between physical arrival and formal customs entry, or the constitutional dimension of the term as used in the Import-Export Clause. Researchers relying solely on Bouvier for the legal content of "imported" will have the foundation but will need to supplement with constitutional and statutory sources for any serious analysis.
Jurisdictional Note
In U.S. law, "imported" has both a federal statutory meaning (defined or implied in successive tariff and customs acts, now largely governed by the Harmonized Tariff Schedule and U.S. Customs regulations) and a constitutional dimension under the Import-Export Clause. State-level usage of the term in tax or regulatory contexts must account for federal preemption and constitutional limits on state power to tax imports.