Beuttell v. United States

7 Ct. Cust. 356
CourtCourt of Customs and Patent Appeals
DecidedDecember 21, 1916
DocketNo. 1696
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 7 Ct. Cust. 356 (Beuttell v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Customs and Patent Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Beuttell v. United States, 7 Ct. Cust. 356 (ccpa 1916).

Opinion

De Yries, Judge,

delivered the opinion of the court:

The legislative conspectus, the construction of which is by this appeal presented to the court, is embraced in the following paragraphs of the tariff act of 1913:

293. Aubusson, Axminster, moquette, and chenille carpets, figured or plain, and all carpets or carpeting of like character or description, 35 per centum ad valorem.
294. Saxony, Milton, and Tournay velvet carpets, figured or plain, and all carpets or carpeting of like character or description, 30 per centum ad valorem.
296. Velvet and tapestry velvet carpets, figured or plain, printed on the warp or otherwise, and all carpets or carpeting of like character or description, 30 per centum ad valorem.
297. Tapestry Brussels carpets, figured or plain, and all carpets or carpeting of like character or description, printed on the warp or otherwise, 20 per centum ad valorem.
303. Mats, rugs for floors, screens, covers, hassocks, bed sides, art squares, and other portions of carpets or carpeting, composed wholly or in part of wool, and not specially provided for in this section, shall be subjected to the rate of duty herein imposed on carpets or carpeting of like character or description.
300. Carpets of every description, woven whole for rooms, and Oriental, Berlin, Aubusson, Axminster, and similar rugs, 50 per centum ad valorem.

The appeal involves an importation of seamless Wilton rugs markedl “A,” and of seamless tapestry Brussels rugs marked “B” on the’ invoice. They were on importation classified by the collector as-“rugs, similar to Axminster rugs,” under paragraph 300, sufra, which classification was on protest sustained by the Board of General! Appraisers, Mr. Geroral Appraiser Brown disserting. The importers appeal to this court, assigning as error and claiming here, as below, that the articles are properly dutiable as “rugs for floors” as that term is employed in paragraph 303, supra.

The record is replete with testimony of several trade witnesses of intelligence and exceptional understanding as to the manufacture of and trade usage relating to the various kinds and classes of rugs known to the wholesale trade of this country.

The quoted legislative epitome makes clear that Congress therein had in mind and distinguished for dutiable purposes two kinds of rugs, to wit, “Oriental, Berlin, Aubusson, Axminster, and similar rugs,” of paragraph 300, and “rugs for floors,” as otherwise qualified in paragraph 3C3. We may well anticipate then that the record would deal solely with articles known as “rugs,” the question being what did Congress intend as the line of differentiation between the two classes of rugs thus made differently dutiable.

Previous litigation has afforded aid in the proper interpretation of paragraph 3C3. Essentially the same language was used in the tariff [358]*358act of 1883, paragraph 378, providing that “mats, rugs, screens, covers, hassocks, bed sides, and other portions of carpets or carpetings, shall be subjected to the rate of duty herein imposed on carpets or carpeting of like character or description.” (Italics ours.) (22 Stat. L., 510.) In Beuttell v. Magone (157 U. S., 154, 158), the Supreme Court construed these words, thereby declaring the class of rugs included therewithin to be “rugs made from portions of carpets and carpetings.” The court employed the following language:

It is clear that rugs in the generic sense are specifically dutiable as such under the foregoing provisions. The imposition of a different duty on rugs of a particular kind is an exception to the general rule established by the statute. The exception is as “to rugs, screens, covers, hassocks, bed sides, and other portions of carpets and car-petings,” which are made to pay the duty imposed on “carpets and carpetings of like character and description.” The obvious construction of this language is that which makes the words “other portions of carpets and carpetings” qualify the enumerated articles, and, of course, if they be thus construed only rugs made from “portions of carpets and carpetings” would be subject to the exceptional classification.
It is urged that this interpretation is erroneous, because the limiting words “other portions of carpets .and carpetings’’simply qualify the last of the enumerated articles; that is, the word -“bed side,” and none other. It is self-evident that the qualifying words must be held to relate to some of the items embraced in the enumeration which they qualify. To hold otherwise would be to read them out of the statute. Do they qualify all or one is the question. To hold that they qualify only one of the items of the enumeration is to make that item an exception, and therefore make the statute operate an absurdity. If the qualifying words only apply to “bed sides,” then all the other items enumerated, viz, “mats, rugs, screens, covers, and hassocks,” are dutiable at the rate imposed on “carpets and carpetings of like character and description,” although they be not made from “other portions of carpets and carpetings,” whilst “bed sides,” whatever may be their similarity to “carpets or carpetings,” will only be dutiable at the rate of carpets and carpetings if made from pieces of carpets. It can not be supposed the intention of the statute was to operate this inequality or to work out this unjust result. The articles are all enumerated together, and the manifest purpose is that all of them shall pay a like duty under similar conditions. We can not violate the express language in order to dissociate things classed together by the law, and thus make one of the class subject to a higher duty than the others, although they be of like character and description.

Speaking of tbe entire legislative concept of that act the court in the same case (p. 160) employed language defining the congressional intent here equally pertinent and instructive:

We think the purpose of the statute, plainly conveyed by its text, was to tax carpets as enumerated therein. That the effect of its language and its intent were also to tax rugs, made as rugs, and clearly distinguishable as such, by reason of their process of manufacture, size, shape, pattern, etc., at the duty imposed on rugs, but to tax rugs made from pieces of carpets or carpetings at the rate imposed on the carpet from which they were made, since, although answering the purpose of a rug, they were really carpeting itself, being made from parts or portions thereof.

Aided by this interpretation of paragraph 303, which in the pertinent particulars is in essentially the same language as that part of the act of 1883 construed in Beuttell v. Magone, supra, other pertinent portions of the act may be more easily assigned the true congressional [359]*359intent. It follows primarily that paragraph 303 was intended by Congress to include only those rugs “made from carpets or carpeting.” Paragraph 300, however, contains an instructive and corroborative phrase. It provides in part for “carpets of every description, woven whole for rooms." The express inclusion of this class of “carpets” or carpeting in paragraph 300 by Congress indicates the other enumerations therein would not otherwise have included it. In other words, that carpets and carpeting and things made therefrom were not otherwise embraced within paragraph 300.

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Related

United States v. Stone & Downer Co.
274 U.S. 225 (Supreme Court, 1927)
United States v. Vandegrift & Co.
11 Ct. Cust. 333 (Customs and Patent Appeals, 1922)
United States v. Trorlicht, Duncker Carpet Co.
10 Ct. Cust. 254 (Customs and Patent Appeals, 1921)
Beuttell & Sons v. United States
8 Ct. Cust. 409 (Customs and Patent Appeals, 1918)

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7 Ct. Cust. 356, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/beuttell-v-united-states-ccpa-1916.