United States v. Nassau Smelting & Refining Works, Ltd.

17 C.C.P.A. 382, 1930 CCPA LEXIS 7
CourtCourt of Customs and Patent Appeals
DecidedJanuary 15, 1930
DocketNo. 3239
StatusPublished

This text of 17 C.C.P.A. 382 (United States v. Nassau Smelting & Refining Works, Ltd.) 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. Nassau Smelting & Refining Works, Ltd., 17 C.C.P.A. 382, 1930 CCPA LEXIS 7 (ccpa 1930).

Opinion

Bland, Judge,

delivered tbe opinion of tbe court:

Tbis is an appeal from tbe judgment of tbe United States Customs Court sustaining tbe importing company’s protest and bolding tbe imported merchandise involved free of duty under paragraph 1555 of tbe Tariff Act of 1922 as “Composition metal of which copper is-tbe component material of chief value, not specially provided for.”

Tbe appraiser reported that tbe importation was composition metal in ingots and contained 13.50 per centum lead. It also contained 20 per centum tin, 1.50 per centum zinc, and 65 per centum copper, and copper was tbe component of chief value. Duty was assessed on tbe lead contained therein in accordance with tbe provision of paragraph 393 of said act at tbe rate of 2% cents per pound.

There is no brief for appellee in tbis court, but its position may be stated from tbe following which is found in tbe protest:

Paragraph No. 1555 shows composition metal, copper chief value, to enter free. The copper contents of the above importation represent its chief value, ' and no duty can properly be charged on any of its other contents.
[383]*383There are other composition metals in which copper is not chief value, and when these contain lead, the tariff clearly provides that the lead contents shall pay a duty of per lb. If that had also been the intention in reference to composition metal having copper chief value, the tariff undoubtedly would also so state. However, when the tariff clearly provides that composition metal shall enter free so long as copper is chief value, we do not see how it, in fact, can be made subject to duty on one of its lesser constituents. So long as it is made to pay any duty whatever, it simply does not enter free as the tariff provides it should enter.

• The two competing paragraphs are as follows:

Pab. 393. Lead bullion or base bullion, lead in pigs and bars, lead dross, reclaimed lead, scrap lead, antimonial lead, antimonial scrap lead, type metal, Babbitt metal, solder, all alloys or combinations of lead not specially provided for, 2Ys cents per pound on the lead contained therein; lead in sheets, pipe, shot, glazier’s lead, and lead wire, 2% cents per pound. [Italics ours.]
Pab. 1555. Composition metal of which copper is the component material of chief value, not specially provided for.

The court below, after stating the issue, said:

It is conceded by the appraiser that the material is composition metal; the Government analyst’s report shows copper to be the component material of chief value. Since, therefore, the merchandise under consideration accurately responds to that provided for in said paragraph 1555, we hold it to be properly entitled to free entry under that paragraph, as alleged by the plaintiff.

The Government argued in this court that it was the duty of the importer to prove in the trial below that the importation was “neither an alloy nor a combination of lead”; that paragraph 393 is new and that Congress in the enactment of the paragraph adopted entirely different language from that in the predecessor paragraph 153, Tariff Act of 1913, which was “lead in any form not specially provided for in this section,” and that this change in language, as well as the change in language in the free-list provision, imports a change in meaning. The Government also cites decisions of this court in United States v. Consolidated Kansas City Smelting & Refining Co., 8 Ct. Cust. Appls. 226, T. D. 37495, and Lang et al. v. United States, 10 Ct. Cust. Appls. 228, T. D. 38563.

It is true that courts have frequently declared that a change in language of legislative acts imports a change in meaning, but, for reasons which will appear later, we can not see where this rule affects or controls the decision of this case.

A careful consideration of all questions decided and discussed in the two cases cited prompts the conclusion that they are not authority for the result which the Government seeks in the case at bar.

In the Consolidated Kansas City Smelting & Refining Co. case, supra, the importation consisted of mattes in which the lead content largely predominated in weight over the copper content. They were held not to be regulus of copper under the free-list paragraph 461 of the Tariff Act of 1913, upon the ground that they were not shown to [384]*384possess the necessary amount of copper, and not to fall within the provision of paragraph 153 for “lead in any form not specially provided for in this section,” but that they were dutiable by similitude under the provision-in paragraph 152 for “lead-bearing ores.”

In the Lang case, supra, the importation involved consisted of mattes varying in copper content from 22 to 52 per centum and in similar lead content from 17 to 57 per centum. Some contained gold, silver, platinum, or iridium. In each and all the copper was greater in value than the lead content. They were classified as “lead in any form” under paragraph 153 of the Tariff Act of 1913. They were claimed to be free of duty as regulus of copper under paragraph 461. The lower court evidently held with the collector that the merchandise was “lead in any form.” This court reversed the lower court and held that the merchandise was entitled to free entry as “regulus of copper,” and that mattes and regulus, for the purposes of the decision, would be regarded as synonymous, and said:

Obviously, in this enactment Congress had in mind that mattes frequently, if not always, carried large lead contents; and, being so advised, in one part of the act limited that content to 10 per cent in legislating with reference to certain mattes, but, in another part of the act, placed no limit upon the lead content of copper mattes, or “regulus of * * * copper,” long held the legal and commercial equivalent of copper matte. The congressional purpose, then, to not limit the lead content of regulus of copper or copper matte, is undeniable; and, until Congress so enacts, it is the duty of this court to decline to read into the act that which Congress, fully advised, did not do. [Italics quoted.]

In the Lang case, it is true that the court said:

For the one and only debatable issue is, are the provisions of either paragraph 152 or 153 sufficiently definite and inclusive to be thereby penetrative of paragraph 461, providing for regulus of copper, and therein reach and thereby make dutiable the lead content of the copper matte or regulus made free thereby? If, as we have concluded, this material is not lead “ore” within paragraph 152 and is not “lead in any form” within paragraph 153, that question is conclusively answered in the negative, for in no event are those paragraphs applicable to or do they lay hold of these importations.

From this the Government argues that, if either paragraph 152 or paragraph 153 had described the merchandise, it would have been sufficiently “penetrative” to have reached and made dutiable the lead content in the regulus, and that since, according to its contention, the lead is provided for in paragraph 393 of the present act, the Lang case is authority for holding that the lead in the composition metal at bar is dutiable.

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Related

United States v. Consolidated Kansas City Smelting & Refining Co.
8 Ct. Cust. 226 (Customs and Patent Appeals, 1917)
Lang v. United States
10 Ct. Cust. 228 (Customs and Patent Appeals, 1920)

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17 C.C.P.A. 382, 1930 CCPA LEXIS 7, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-nassau-smelting-refining-works-ltd-ccpa-1930.