Nakamoto v. United States

11 Cust. Ct. 468, 1943 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 3765
CourtUnited States Customs Court
DecidedNovember 15, 1943
DocketNo. 5951; Entry No. A-51
StatusPublished

This text of 11 Cust. Ct. 468 (Nakamoto v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Customs Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Nakamoto v. United States, 11 Cust. Ct. 468, 1943 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 3765 (cusc 1943).

Opinion

Keefe, Judge:

This application for review involves a shipment of merchandise invoiced as “Hokkigai Boiled canned shell fish,” imported from Japan. Three cases contained 8 dozen 4%-ounce tins and five cases contained 4 dozen 9-ounce tins. The merchandise was invoiced at the purchase price in Japanese yen, packing and inland freight included. It was entered under duress to meet advances of the appraiser in previous cases on the basis of the American selling price, and appraised as entered.

The correctness of the entered and appraised values is not raised. The only question presented is whether or not the American selling price is the proper basis of appraisement. Such issue becomes pertinent by reason of a. proclamation by the President of the United States, as promulgated and published in T. D. 47031, issued under and by virtue of section 336 of the Tariff Act of 1930, after investiga[469]*469tion by the Tariff Commission, to equalize the differences in the cost of production, decreeing that the assessment of duty at 35 per centum ad valorem under paragraph 721 (b) of the Tariff Act of 1930 on clams other than razor clams and clams in combination with other substances, (except clam chowder), packed in airtight containers, shall be taken upon the basis of the American selling price, as defined in-section 402 (g) of said act.

The plaintiff before the trial court contended that the imported merchandise was not canned clams for tariff purposes and therefore should be appraised upon the basis of foreign, export, or United States value or at the cost of production thereof, rather than at the American selling price, and evidence was introduced in an effort to establish that the canned shellfish was not a clam.

Counsel for the Government objected to the introduction of any testimony affecting the classification of the merchandise as immaterial, as the only question before the court was one of value on reappraisement. The lower coui’t overruled the objection of Government counsel upon authority of United States v. Hauptmann, 25 C. C. P. A. 323, T. D. 49423, and admitted such evidence.

The importer and the Government each examined two well-qualified witnesses, holding degrees in zoology and being well-known concholo-gists. Also certain exhibits were admitted in evidence. Plaintiff’s exhibit 1 was offered and received in evidence as representative of the type of merchandise covered by the invoice, being later removed from the ah bight container and placed in a glass jar, marked exhibit 1-Á. Plaintiff’s exhibit 2 consisted of a publication entitled “The Edible Bivalves of California” by Paul Bonnot. Plaintiff’s exhibit 3 consisted of a book entitled “Pish and Game Code, 1939-1941” issued by the State of California, Department of Natural Resources, Division of Pish and Game. The Government introduced as an illustrative exhibit, marked “A,” a photograph of the shell of the hokki-gai that one of the Government witnesses had seen in Japan, and had photographed from an official publication of the Japanese Government entitled “Japanese Aquatic Plants and Animals.”

The trial court held that the imported merchandise was intended to enter the commerce of the United States as a clam and consequently the American selling price was the proper basis to be used in determining the value for duty purposes. The court stated:

The scientific witnesses in this case agree that the word “clam” is not a scientific word and has no definite scientific meaning. The common meaning of the word “clam” is thus defined in Webster’s New International Dictionary 2d. ed.:
clam 1. Any of various bivalve móllusks, esp. of certain edible kinds * * *.
The flexible tariff provisions, as used in this instance, are intended to meet and correct an adverse competitive condition.
It is very significant that the label of the imported merchandise advertises the goods as “Geisha Brand Hokki Clams,” and in addition carries a picture that no [470]*470doubt, to the layman or shopping housewife, would appear to characterize 2 clam shells.
It is a well-established rule of constructiop that when Congress, in writing the tariff act, uses a word having a common meaning, without any further qualifications, that there is no need to go beyond such common meaning, unless such word is shown to have a different commercial meaning. This record contains no proof whatever as to commercial meaning.
The same rule would apply when the President of the United States uses a word quoted from and applied to the tariff act, such as the use of the word “clams” in T. D. 47031.
Whether or not the imported merchandise is a' clam or a cockle, in the terminology of science, it is unnecessary for me to determine, for the reason that the word “clam” has a common meaning and that 1 am firmly convinced that the importation herein comes within the definition of such meaning, and also for the reason that when this merchandise was imported it was beyond a doubt intended that it enter the commerce of the United States as a clam.

Tbe appellant contends in his brief that the lower court erred, setting out his contention in language following:

1. In concluding that it was unnecessary to determine whether or not the merchandise “is a * * * cockle, in the terminology of science” (assignment 5). * * *.
2. In accepting as a definition of the common meaning the language quoted from Webster’s New International Dictionary (assignment 3), when the quotation is incomplete and is inapplicable, because it embraces not only clams but also bivalve mollusks which are commonly known as cockles, oysters, scallops, etc.
3. In finding “that the importation herein comes within such meaning,” in disregard of the fact that, even though the merchandise is an edible bivalve mollusk, it is not a clam if it is a cardium or cockle, nor is it a clam if it is mactridae-sachalinensis or hokkigai.
4. In finding that it was unnecessary to determine whether the merchandise “is a clam or cockle, in the terminology of science * * * for the reason that when * * * imported it was without doubt intended that it would enter the commerce of the United States as a clam.” (assignment 6). By this finding the court again erroneously assumed that “clam” and “cockle” are scientific terms, and erroneously held that an assumed intention of an importer to sell an article as a “clam” is sufficient to establish its identity as such for tariff purposes.

The common meaning of the various terms used to describe and differentiate certain shellfish appears in the Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia as follows:

mollush, mollusc * * *. A soft-bodied animal, usually with an external shell; a member of the Mollusca in any sense. Yol. 5, page 3825.
Mollusca * * *. One of the leading divisions of invertebrated animals; an extensive series of invertebrates whose bodies are soft, without any jointed legs, and commonly covered with a hard shell in one, two, or more pieces, and whose principal parts are neither segmented into a series of longitudinal rings, as in insects, crustaceans, and worms, nor radiately arranged, as in echinoderms; the mollusks, as the univalve or bivalve shellfish of ordinary language.

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11 Cust. Ct. 468, 1943 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 3765, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nakamoto-v-united-states-cusc-1943.