United States v. Jamison

31 Cust. Ct. 468, 1953 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 1299
CourtUnited States Customs Court
DecidedOctober 22, 1953
DocketA. R. D. 32; Entry No. 560, etc.
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 31 Cust. Ct. 468 (United States v. Jamison) 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
United States v. Jamison, 31 Cust. Ct. 468, 1953 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 1299 (cusc 1953).

Opinion

Oliver, Chief Judge:

This case is before us as a review of the decision in Tom Jamison v. United States, 28 Cust. Ct. 610, Reap. Dec. 8110, involving certain leather riding saddles made with a smooth-stamped design as a decoration. The articles were imported from Magdalena, Sonora, Mexico, into the port of Nogales, Ariz. The trial judge found foreign value (section 402 (c) of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended by the Customs Administrative Act of 1938) to be the proper basis for appraisement and held such statutory value to be 190 pesos per saddle, plus sales tax. The conclusion of the lower court sustained the importer’s entered value.

The Government, as appellant in these proceedings, claims that the proper value for this merchandise is the appraised value of 214 pesos per saddle, while appellee contends for his purchase price of 190 pesos each, plus sales tax, as found by the trial court.

The opinion of the trial judge was based on an issue expressed in his decision as follows: “The advance in price of 24 pesos each involves solely the question of what constitutes a usual wholesale quantity in the ordinary course of trade.” While we recognize the [469]*469controlling effect of that question and proceed with our discussion accordingly, our analysis of the record leads to a conclusion different from that reached by the trial court.

The record consists of the oral testimony of three witnesses, i. e., the Mexican manufacturer of these saddles, the importer of the merchandise, and the customs broker who made the entries in question, all of whom appeared on behalf of appellee (plaintiff below); and a customs agent’s report, collective exhibit 2, offered by appellant (defendant below). The evidence will be summarized collectively, without outlining the testimony of each witness and the customs agent’s report individually.

Several shipments are involved herein. They extend over the period from November 1944 to May 1946. The purchase price in every instance was 190 pesos for each saddle. The earliest purchases were based on “a verbal agreement as to price and number of saddles to be delivered” (collective exhibit 2). Later, the Mexican manufacturer and the importer entered into written agreements, the importer testifying that he had “two or three.” There is in evidence one of those contracts, executed on May 18, 1945 (collective exhibit 1), which, as disclosed from an English translation embodied in the said customs agent’s report, covers 400 saddles to be delivered “in partial shipments of 25 and 30 each fifteen days,” beginning June 15, 1945, with final delivery to be completed by December 15th of the same year.

The business routine followed between the Mexican manufacturer and the American importer is explained in the customs agent’s report. It appears therefrom that when a shipment of these saddles was ready for delivery, notification thereof was given to the importer’s representative in Magdalena, Mexico, the place of manufacture of the present merchandise and a principal market therefor in the country of exportation. The importer’s Mexican representative took delivery of the saddles and hauled them by truck to Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, at the Mexican border, where the importer accepted them, giving his representative a check in payment for the merchandise. The importer’s representative, after his return to Magdalena, cashed the check and delivered the amount to the manufacturer. The manufacturer kept no record of any transaction. As stated in the customs agent’s report, the Mexican manufacturer “did not maintain an. official invoice book in order to avoid payment of the invoice stamp taxes,” and “he kept no records whatsoever of his transactions other than a copy of a contract which he and Mr. Jamison signed on May 18, 1945.”

The Mexican manufacturer of the present merchandise testified that, at the time of exportation of the saddles in question, he was the largest manufacturer of such merchandise in Magdalena, Mexico. He [470]*470stated that a wholesale quantity of saddles, the same as those in question, was “upward from 10,” and that “when they purchase less than 10 saddles the price was a little higher than when they bought more than 10 saddles.” The manufacturer’s capacity to make sales to purchasers, other than the importer herein, in what he regarded as wholesale quantities of 10 or more, is disclosed in the following excerpt from his testimony:

Q. Could you have sold quantities of 10 or more to other than Jamison if you had received such orders? — A. I could not obligate myself to furnish other suppliers due to the fact that I was pretty busy with Jamison’s orders.
Q. If you had such orders for quantities of 10 or more of the saddles such as you sold Jamison, could you have produced them?
*******
A. No, I could not have delivered them.

Sales to others were made, as stated by the Mexican manufacturer, when “Jamison did not call for the saddles that I had ready, and as I needed money, I had to make a trip to Nogales occasionally to sell them and get some money.” In this connection, he referred to transactions with Carrasco Bros., to whom sales were made, “about four or five times,” in quantities of “three; sometimes for four; sometimes eight, according to the circumstances in his store,” at 214 pesos per saddle, which, as stated in the customs agent's report, the manufacturer “considered his ‘retail’ value and not a wholesale value.” The record herein identifies the said Carrasco Bros, as a buyer of these saddles for resale in its curio store at Nogales, Ariz.

The sales to Carrasco Bros, have much significance in this controversy. It appears from the record that in those transactions the manufacturer transported the saddles from Magdalena, the place of manufacture and the principal market for the merchandise, to Nogales, Sonora, where they were delivered and accepted by Carrasco Bros., who imported the articles for resale in its store at Nogales, Ariz. The manufacturer testified that his sales price to Carrasco Bros., of 214 pesos per saddle, included “transportation charges from Magdalena to Nogales [Sonora],” and that he “absorbed the transportation charges.” “It is well-settled law that a market in the sense in which the term is used in the tariff act is a place where merchandise is sold as distinguished from a place where merchandise is delivered.” United States v. Hallet & Carey Co., 68 Treas. Dec. 1286, Reap. Dec. 3668. In this case, the principal market was Magdalena where the price to the American dealer, Carrasco Bros., was 214 pesos per saddle.

The Mexican manufacturer made mention of occasional sales to tourists and also referred to one instance when he bought saddles, like those in question, at a time when his own production was insufficient to supply the orders of the present importer. All of those transactions were “sporadic sales or sales in minor quantities,” and, therefore, [471]*471merit no consideration in finding the value of the saddles under consideration. G. W. Pleissner v. United States, 16 Ct. Cust. Appls. 507, T. D. 43237.

The record also makes reference to a sale by the manufacturer of the present merchandise of six saddles, the same as those in question, at $44 each (United States currency) to J. B. Stiles of Wilcox, Ariz. Whether or not this purchaser bought for his own use, or for resale, is not disclosed by the record.

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Related

Peacock Sales Co. v. United States
58 Cust. Ct. 757 (U.S. Customs Court, 1967)
Jamison v. United States
42 Cust. Ct. 429 (U.S. Customs Court, 1958)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
31 Cust. Ct. 468, 1953 Cust. Ct. LEXIS 1299, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-jamison-cusc-1953.