United States v. General Dyestuff Corp.

29 C.C.P.A. 53, 1941 CCPA LEXIS 145
CourtCourt of Customs and Patent Appeals
DecidedMay 5, 1941
DocketNo. 4326
StatusPublished

This text of 29 C.C.P.A. 53 (United States v. General Dyestuff Corp.) 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
United States v. General Dyestuff Corp., 29 C.C.P.A. 53, 1941 CCPA LEXIS 145 (ccpa 1941).

Opinion

Bland, Judge,

delivered the opinion of the court:

Appellee, General Dyestuff Corporation, imported on September 4, 1934, at the port of New York, merchandise invoiced as “IG-Wax (Mineral wax),” (called “I. G. WAX Z” in the protest) which was classified by the Collector of Customs under paragraph 1536 of the Tariff Act of 1930 as a manufacture of wax and assessed with duty at 20 per centum ad valorem.

Appellee in its protest claimed that the merchandise was entitled to entry free of duty “under the provisions for animal, vegetable, or mineral waxes, in Paragraph 1796” of said act. Alternative claim was made that the merchandise was dutiable as a nonenumerated article under paragraph 1558 of said act at 10 or 20 per centum ad valorem. By amendment to the protest, further claim was made that the merchandise was free of duty under paragraph 1733 of said act as “Oils, mineral: * * * paraffin, * * *, not specially provided for.” This latter claim is not pressed in this court.

The parties to this suit entered into a stipulation regarding the manufacture of the involved merchandise, the pertinent part of which stipulation follows:

That I. G. WAX Z, the merchandise at bar, is produced from Montan Wax by the following process:
Montan Wax, which is obtained from lignite or brown coal, is bleached with chromic acid;
[55]*55Bleached Montan Wax is then reduced with iron powder and hydrogenated with a nickel catalyst;
The resulting hydrocarbon is the merchandise at bar.

In Chambers’ Technical Dictionary (1940) montan wax is defined as follows:

montan wax (Chem.) A bituminous wax extracted under high temperature and pressure from lignite. It is dark brown in colour, and can be bleached. M. p. 80°-90° C.; soluble in benzene, chloroform, carbon tetrachloride. It forms the basis for the metallic soaps which are used for making the original recordings in gramophone-disc manufacture.

The imported commodity has a white, crystalline appearance something like paraffin, is waxy in character, and, on account of its high melting point and other qualities, is used for the purpose of making wax polishes, as a substitute for paraffin in the manufacture of paper drinking cups for hot beverages, in preparing imitation food displays, for the wax coating of anodyzed aluminum plate, for coating and impregnating paper, and for insulating wire.

At the trial appellee adduced the testimony of four witnesses. The Government produced no witness. The testimony discloses the uses of the wax in the condition as imported and the opinions of various witnesses as to its quality and name. The record cleaily shows that the imported merchandise has been processed, by the steps indicated above, from its ordinary condition as montan wax to a condition for highly specialized uses, for which uses it was not suitable in its original condition as montan wax. The record also shows that there are other mineral waxes having a crystalline appearance such as ceresin,ozokerite, and paraffin, which are in some respects similar to the imported merchandise, that is to say, they have a somewhat similar appearance and are suitable for some of the uses of the imported article. The oxygen in the montan wax has been removed by the reduction process " and the nickel catalytic process has added hydrogen to it. The treatment also took out organic acids and saponifiable matter.

The trial court sustained the claim of appellee that the involved merchandise was entitled to free entry under paragraph 1733, supra, and it is from its judgment so holding that the Government has taken the instant appeal.

The Government here contends that the imported article has been manufactured to the point where it has acquired new uses and a new name and is therefore a manufacture of wax under paragraph 1536, Tariff Act of 1930, as classified by the collector, which paragraph reads as follows:

Par. 1536. Candles, 27J4 per centum ad valorem; manufactures of amber, bladders, or wax, or of which these substances or any of them is the component material of chief value, not specially provided for, 20 per centum ad valorem.

It makes an alternative contention that in event it be held that the merchandise is not a manufacture of wax under paragraph 1536, [56]*56it should be held dutiable as a Donenumerated manufactured article under paragraph 1558.

The importer urges that the trial court properly held that regardless of the manufacturing effort expended upon the material from the time it responded to the name of montan wax until it acquired the name of “I. G. Wax Z,” it nevertheless remained wax and is properly described and classifiable under the free list provision 1796 which reads:

Par. 1796. Wax: Animal, vegetable, or mineral, not specially provided for.

In appealing to this court the Government has, by its assignments of error, properly challenged the correctness of the trial court’s finding that the goods were free of duty under paragraph 1796 and the refusal of the trial court to hold the merchandise dutiable under paragraph 1536, but there is no assignment of error in the record which challenges the action of the trial court in not holding the merchandise dutiable under paragraph 1558 as a nonenumerated manufactured article. The question is first raised in this court in the Government’s brief. Under such circumstances, the importer contends that this court is without authority to pass upon the question as to whether or not the involved merchandise is a nonenumerated, manufactured article.

We disagree with the Government that the instant material should be held dutiable as assessed as a manufacture of wax at 20 per centum ad valorem. It is still a material, though a manufactured one, which has passed from its state as montan wax, in which state it would be classifiable under the free list provision for mineral wax, into such a different material as to no longer, in our judgment, respond to the term “mineral wax” foimd in said paragraph. While it is waxy in character, it is a material, and, as its name and use indicates, it is a wax which has been so processed and manufactured that its original nature and wax characteristics have been greatly altered and changed. The wax at bar has been bleached. It has been reduced with iron powder and has been run over a nickel catalyst, in which processes the oxygen has been removed and hydrogen added. These processes have transformed it into a new material with new uses for which the original material, montan wax, was not suitable.

Irrespective of the merits of the contention of the Government that the imported merchandise by manufacturing processes has acquired a new name, and irrespective of any tariff significance to be given to this consideration under the circumstances at bar, it may be noted that the imported merchandise was originally montan wax, and although it has been highly processed it is still called wax and referred to as “I. G. Wax Z.” Whether this is merely a trade name of a particular kind of wax, does not definitely appear from the record. Merely adding a trade prefix to the word “wax” could hardly be said to be changing the name of the commodity from “wax” to some other name in a tariff sense.

[57]

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Bluebook (online)
29 C.C.P.A. 53, 1941 CCPA LEXIS 145, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-general-dyestuff-corp-ccpa-1941.