---
kind: "section"
citation: "7 U.S.C. § 511"
title: "7"
title_heading: "Agriculture"
number: "511"
heading: "Definitions"
release: "119-102"
date: "2026-07-12"
url: "https://uscodex.org/usc/7/511"
units:
  - "Chapter 21A — Tobacco Inspection"
---

# §511. Definitions


When used in this chapter—

- (a) “Person” includes partnerships, associations, and corporations, as well as individuals.
- (b) “Secretary” means the Secretary of Agriculture of the United States.
- (c) “Inspector” means any [person](#a) employed, licensed, or authorized by the [Secretary](#b) to determine and certify the type, grade, condition, or other characteristics of [tobacco](#f).
- (d) “Sampler” means any [person](#a) employed, licensed, or authorized by the [Secretary](#b) to select, tag, and seal official samples of [tobacco](#f).
- (e) “Weigher” means any [person](#a) employed, licensed, or authorized by the [Secretary](#b) to weigh and certify the weight of [tobacco](#f).
- (f) “Tobacco” means tobacco in its unmanufactured form.
- (g) “Auction market” means a [market](/usc/7/198.md?p=1) or place to which [tobacco](#f) is delivered by the producers thereof, or their agents, for sale at auction through a warehouseman or [commission merchant](/usc/7/499a.md?p=b-5).
- (h) Words in the singular form shall be deemed to import the plural form when necessary.
- (i) “Commerce” means commerce between any [State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5), Territory, or possession, or the District of Columbia, and any place outside thereof; or between points within the same [State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5), Territory, or possession, or the District of Columbia, but through any place outside thereof; or within any Territory or possession, or the District of Columbia. For the purposes of this chapter (but not in any wise limiting the foregoing definition) a transaction in respect to [tobacco](#f) shall be considered to be in commerce if such [tobacco](#f) is part of that current of commerce usual in the [tobacco](#f) industry whereby [tobacco](#f) or products manufactured therefrom are sent from one [State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5) with the expectation that they will end their transit, after purchase, in another, including, in addition to cases within the above general description, all cases where purchase or sale is either for shipment to another [State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5) or for manufacture within the [State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5) and the shipment outside the [State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5) of the products resulting from such manufacture. [Tobacco](#f) normally in such current of commerce shall not be considered out of such current through resort being had to any means or device intended to remove transactions in respect thereto from the provisions of this chapter. For the purpose of this paragraph the word “[State](/usc/7/198.md?p=5)” includes Territory, the District of Columbia, possession of the United States, and foreign nations.

## Source credit

(Aug. 23, 1935, ch. 623, § 1, 49 Stat. 731.)