S. M. Brachman & Co. v. United States

5 Cust. Ct. 153, 1940 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 2124
CourtUnited States Customs Court
DecidedOctober 25, 1940
DocketC. D. 389
StatusPublished
Cited by24 cases

This text of 5 Cust. Ct. 153 (S. M. Brachman & Co. 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
S. M. Brachman & Co. v. United States, 5 Cust. Ct. 153, 1940 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 2124 (cusc 1940).

Opinion

Bkown, Judge:

This suit against the United States was brought at New York to recover customs duties claimed to have been illegally collected on certain dogskins imported from China in the period 1930 to 1936.

The collector of customs took duty at 25 per centum ad valorem under paragraph 1519 (a) of the Tariff Act of 1930. Said paragraph reads as follows:

Par. 1519. (a) Dressed furs and dressed fur skins (except silver or black fox), and plates, mats, linings, strips, and crosses of dressed dog, goat, or kid skins, 25 per centum ad valorem; all the foregoing, if dyed, 30 per centum ad valorem.
(b) Manufactures of fur (except silver or black fox), further advanced than dressing, prepared for use as material (whether or not joined or sewed together) including plates, mats, linings, strips, and crosses (except plates, mats, linings, strips, and crosses of dog, goat, and kid skins), if not dyed, 35 per centum ad .valorem; if dyed, 40 per centum ad valorem.

The following claims for classification under paragraphs 1681 and 1558 appear in the protests, the principal claim being under paragraph 1681, reading as follows:

[Free List]
Par. 1681. Furs and fur skins, not specially provided for, undressed.

Paragraph 1558 reads as follows:

Par. 1558. That there shall be levied, collected, and paid on the importation of all raw or unmanufactured articles not enumerated or provided for, a duty of 10 per centum ad valorem, and on all articles manufactured, in whole or in part, not specially provided for, a duty of 20 per centum ad valorem.

The tariff act also contains another free list provision dealing with furs reading as follows:

Par. 1765. Skins of all kinds, raw, and hides not specially provided for.

[155]*155As the expression “skins of all kinds, raw” would include raw fur skins, it is evident that Congress by including undressed skins in paragraph 1681 intended to cover skins processed beyond the-raw state. Moreover, it would seem also from the language of the three provisions that Congress intended to cover in them every kind of fur and fur skin.

This seems to completely negative point Y of the defendant’s brief where it is vigorously and earnestly argued that in order for a fur skin to be admitted free under paragraph 1681 as “undressed” it must be a “raw” skin. It is there contended that “undressed” and “raw” mean the same thing.

This issue upon practically identical merchandise has been the occasion of long and hotly contested litigation under the Tariff Act of 1930.

This division in a careful and elaborate opinion by Sullivan, Judge, in Rotberg & Krieger v. United States, 68 Treas. Dec. 895, T. D. 48068, decided December 16, 1935, on what we might call a mixed question of law and fact because it involved the meaning of the terms “dressed” and “undressed,” sustained the protest for free entry.

This finding was sustained in United States v. Rotberg & Krieger, 24 C. C. P. A. 441, T. D. 48902, March 22, 1937, in an elaborate opinion by Garrett, Judge, reviewing the authorities and stating the facts, and concluding that the skins were undressed, the appellate court also, as the law requires, passing upon the weight of the evidence to that effect. That testimony comprised about 140 printed pages. It is incorporated into the record in the case at bar.

The Government did not acquiesce in these decisions but made, as it is called, a second or new case upon subsequent protests. That larger record in a case equally hotly contested runs to 740 printed pages.

This second case, Arnhold v. United States, was also decided by division one in a full and elaborate opinion .by Judge Sullivan on October 11, 1938, 1 Cust. Ct. 170, C. D. 44, reviewing the new evidence and the old evidence in great detail and adhering to the holding in the former case that the merchandise was not dressed fur skins within the provisions of paragraph 1519(a), but fur skins, undressed, and free of duty as such under paragraph 1681, and that being expressly enumerated therein paragraph 1558 covering nonenumerated articles did not apply.

Presiding Judge McClelland concurred in the finding that the dog-skins involved were not dressed and therefore could not fall within paragraph 1519 (a), but dissented on the ground that they were, in his opinion, properly dutiable under paragraph 1558 as articles manufactured in whole or in part, not specially provided for. This decision [156]*156was affirmed by the appellate court in United States v. Arnhold & Co., on October 30, 1939, 27 C. C. P. A. 135, C. A. D. 74.

The Court of Customs and Patent Appeals in the Arnhold case quoted from the Botberg case the following statement:

It must be remembered that the sole concern here is with the merchandise in its condition as imported. Four of the witnesses called on behalf of importer qualified as being familiar with that processing of the skins which takes place in China. According to this testimony, it seems that the skins are sometimes, possibly usually (but this is not of importance), taken from the animals in extreme cold weather and placed in piles where they are allowed to lie until the weather becomes warmer. The first process applied to the skins when treatment of them actually begins is to scrape off fat and remove dirt. They are then placed in the ■sun for drying. After being dried, they are placed in barrels or vats containing water with which there is mixed a flour, described as “dalyon flour,” made from some kind of Chinese cereal. They remain in these barrels or vats for several days — one witness says, “perhaps six'or seven days.” They are then taken out and put in the sun for drying. After being dried, if any are in a very hardened condition such are returned to the barrel or vat, again soaked, and again dried in the sun. After being dried, the skins are packed in bales, 200 to 300 skins to the bale, by press packing machines, and thus exported.
So far as the record discloses, the foregoing constitutes the whole of the processing which takes place in China, and the primary question is, Does such processing' render the' skins dressed furs or dressed fur skins within the meaning of paragraph 1519 (a), supra?

and then stated:

■ In the ease at bar it is established that, in addition to the process described in the Rotberg record, there was employed in the treatment of the skins in China sea salt, to the extent of three-quarters of 1 pound to the gallon of water, and that sea salt contains sodium sulphate and sodium chloride.
The real issue, therefore, is whether, in treating the dogskins in China, the use of sea salt in the quantity above stated, in addition to the water and-flour testified to in the Roiberg case, rendered the skins dressed or partially dressed.

That court further stated:

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