Steamboat Company v. the Collector

85 U.S. 478, 21 L. Ed. 769, 18 Wall. 478, 1873 U.S. LEXIS 1323

• Court: Supreme Court of the United States
• Decided: November 17, 1873
• Status: Published

Opinions

Mr. Justice SWAYNE

delivered the opinion of the court.

The plaintiffs in error instituted the suit to recover back the amount of a tax which they allege was exacted from them without warrant of law. They were the owners of a night-line of steamers running between the cities of New York and Albany. The tax was upon the gross receipts from their passengers. Payment was required by the collector under the ninth section of the act of July 18th, 1866.

* The facts, agreed by the parties, make primá, facie a clear case of liability within the language.of this law. The tax was exacted only to the amount prescribed and upon a subject specified. There is no complaint as to either of these particulars. If this were the whole ease there could be no controversy between the parties, and, doubtless, the case would not be here. But the plaintiffs in error insist that, by reason of certain provisions in the acts of June'30th, 1864, and of March 3d, 1865, the ninth section of the act of 1866 does not apply to receipts from passengers upon their steamers.

The one hundred and third section of the act of 1864† imposed a tax of 2J per cent, of the gross receipts from passeugers, freights, and the transportation of the mails, earned by steamboats within the category of those of the plaintiffs in error.

A proviso in the fourth section of the act of 1865‡ declared “ that the receipts of vessels paying tonnage duty shall not be subject to the tax provided in section one hun dred and three of the act of 1864, nor by any act amendatory thereof”

The steamers of the plaintiffs in error paid such tonnage duty. Under these acts they were entitled to the exemption claimed.

But the ninth section of the act of 1866 declared that the one hundr.ed and third section of the act of 1864 should “ be amended by striking out all after the enacting clau'se and inserting in lieu thereof the following.” It then proceeds to tax the receipts from passengers and for carrying the mails under contracts made prior to the taking effect of the act, as was done by the section amended; but.it wholly omits the tax upon freights and upon receipts for carrying the mails under contracts thereafter made, to which they would have been liable under that section, standing.aloue, before it was amended. Three things were taxed by the original section, and but one of them, with the limited exception as to the mails, by the section which superseded it and took its place. The-seventieth section declares “ that this act shall take effect, where not otherwise provided, on the 1st day of August, 1866, and all provisions of any former act inconsistent with the provisions of this act are hereby repealed.”

The one hundred and third section of the act of 1864 was ■thus superseded and annulled. The proviso in the fourth section o.f the act of 1865 fell with it. The latter referred to the former. When the former ceased to exist there was nothing left for the latter to operate upon. The ninth section was much more limited in the taxes which it imposed than the one hundred and third. The two sections were the same neither in letter nor substance.

The tonnage duty in question was imposed by the fifteenth section of the act of July 14th, 1862.* It was thirty cents per ton, and was to be paid once a year. The exemptions in the ninth section must have exceeded it largely in amount. It may well be that, by reason of these remissions, it was deemed proper by Congress that the tax upon the receipts from passengers, as well as the tonnage duty, should thereafter be paid, and that thp exemption as to the former, given by the act of 1865, should no longer continue. Such, in our judgment, was the intent and effect of the ninth section of the act of 1866. It is said that the proviso in the act of 1865 is not expressly repealed. There was no necessity for an express declaration upon the subject. It was superseded by the abrogation of the one hundred, and third section. And the seventieth section of 'the act of 1866 in terms repealed “ all the provisions in any former act- inconsistent with the provisions of this act.” The ninth section of this act declares that the tax here" in question shall be paid. The proviso in the act of 1865 declares that it shall not be paid.

Can there be a clearer inconsistency than that which subsists between these provisions? If Congress intended that the exemption should continue under the act of 1866 as it was under the act of 1864, it would have been easy to say so, and, doubtless, this would have been done.

It is insisted that the twenty-fifth section of the act of July 14th, 1870,* recognizes the continuing existence and force of the proviso in question. That section is as follows:

“ Section 25. And be it further enacted, that section fifteen of the act approved July 14th, 1862, entitled ‘An act increasing temporarily the duties on imports, and for other purposes,’ and section four of the act in amendment thereof, approved March 3d, 1865, be, and the same are hereby, so amended that no ship, vessel, steamer, boat, barge, or flat, belonging to any citizen of the United States, trading from one port or point within the United States to another port or point within the United States, or employed in the bank, whale, or other fisheries, shall hereafter be subject to the tonnage tax or duty provided for in said acts; and the proviso in section one hundred and three of the ‘Act to provide revenue to support the government and to pay interest on the public debt,-and for other purposes,’ approved June 30th, 1864, requiring an annual special tax fo be paid by boats, barges, and flats, is hereby repealed.” This section suggests several remarks.

(U) Section four of the act of 1865 contains other matters besides the proviso in question. There is a reference in the twenty-fifth section to one of those other matters, but none to the proviso.

(2.) The abrogation of the tonnage duty as thus declared, may have been because of the imposition' of the tax here in question by the ninth .section of the act of 1866, in addition to tonnage duty. It v'as a return to the liberal spirit manifested by the act of 1865, but instead of remitting the tax upon passengers and retaining the tonnage duty, it remits the latter and retains the former. It is -not to be supposed that Congress intended to give up both. This legislation gives no support to the- views of the plaintiffs in error.

(3.) The reference to the one hundred and third section of the act of 1864 involves an error of fact. That section contains no such proviso or provision as is mentioned, and, as before shown, it was wholly superseded by the act of' 1866. The proviso referred to is in the ninth section of the last-named act. The reference to it does not in any wise affect the case before us.

Judgment aeeirmed.

14 Stat. at Large, 135.

13 Stat. at Large, 275.

Ib. 493.

12 Stat. at Large, 558.

16 Stat. at Large, 269.