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United States v. Seven Hundred & Seventy Nine Cases of Molasses

174 F. 325, 1909 U.S. App. LEXIS 5184
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
DecidedNovember 5, 1909
DocketNos. 3,030, 3,024
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 174 F. 325 (United States v. Seven Hundred & Seventy Nine Cases of Molasses) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Seven Hundred & Seventy Nine Cases of Molasses, 174 F. 325, 1909 U.S. App. LEXIS 5184 (8th Cir. 1909).

Opinion

POLDOCK, District Judge.

This is a libel of condemnation arising under the provisions of the pure food and drug law, enacted by Congress.June 30, 1906 (34 Stat. 768, c. 3915 [U. S. Comp. St. Supp. 1909, p. 1188]), and the regulations of the Secretaries promulgated October 20, 1906, in pursuance of power conferred on them by section 3 of the act. The facts are:

One C. E. Coe, a merchant of the city of Memphis, Tenn., at various dates between March 18 and August 1, 1908, sold and shipped the 77Í) cases of molasses in controversy to certain wholesale jobbing houses in the city of Tittle Rock, Ark. Thereafter, on August 19th, the district attorney for the district of Arkansas filed his libel of condemnation, in which it was charged the molasses was both adulterated and misbranded in violation of the provisions of the act. A writ of seizure was issued and executed by the marshal, seizing, as shown by his return. 685 cases of the molasses in question. Of the cases seized, as shown by his return, 464 were what is labeled “sugar g-len” molasses, and 221 cases as “burro” molasses. Thereafter on September 21, 1908, bji leave of court, an amended libel of condemnation was filed, in which it was charged the molasses contained in the cases was adulterated by the use of commercial glucose, mixed and packed with the molasses to such extent as to injuriously affect the quality and strength in violation of the law; and it was further charged, in substance, the cases were so labeled and misbranded as to convey the impression the contents of the cases were pure sug-ar house molasses, whereas,' in truth, they were a compound of sugar molasses and corn syrup. Thereafter Coe filed his [327]*327affidavit as claimant of tlie molasses and answered, setting up his guaranty to the purchasers under the terms of the act, denied the charges of adulteration and misbranding, attached as exhibit to his answer a copy of the label of each brand of molasses sold and delivered by him, and demanded a trial by jury, as provided by section 10 of the act, and gave a bond as provided in the act to secure possession of the molasses. A trial by jury was had, at which, by direction of the court, the jury returned a verdict in favor of the claimant, on which a judgment was entered in his favor. Prom this judgment the government, being uncertain as to its rights, prosecutes its appeal in case No. 3,021 and also prosecutes error in case No. 3,030.

From the statement made it would seem quite plain the proceedings ou the trial cannot be re-examined by this court on the appeal taken. Section 10 of the act, among other matters, provides as follows:

“That any article of food, drug or liquor that is adulterated or misbranded within the meaning of this act. and is being transported from one state, territory. district, or insular possession to another I'or sale, or having been transported. remains unloaded, unsold or in original unbroken packages, or if it be sold or offered for sale in the District of Columbia or the territories, or insular possessions of the United States, or if it he imported from a foreign country for sale, or if it is intended for export to a foreign country, shall he liable to he proceeded against in any District Court of the United States within the district where the same is found, and seized for confiscation by a process of libel l’or condemnation. * * * The proceedings of such libel shall conform, as near as may be, to the proceedings in admiralty, except that either party may demand trial by jury of any issue of fact joined in any such case, and all such proceedings shall be at the suit of and in the name of the United States.”

The right to trial by jury granted by this act on demand of either party is absolute, and means a trial by jury according to the established practice in courts of common law. Elliott v. Toeppner, 187 U. S. 327, 23 Sup. Ct. 133, 47 L. Ed. 200; Insurance Company v. Comstock, 16 Wall. 258, 21 L. Ed. 493; Parsons v. Bedford, 3 Pet. 433, 7 L. Ed. 732 ; Bower v. Holzworth et al., 138 Fed. 28, 70 C. C. A. 396; Duncan v. Landis, 106 Fed. 839, 45 C. C. A. 666. By article 7 of the Constitution it is provided:

“Xo fact tried by a. jury shall he otherwise re-examined in any court of tiie United ¡States, than according to the rules of Ore common law.”

Mr. Justice Clifford, delivering the opinion of the court in Insurance Company v. Comstock, supra, in commenting on this provision of the Constitution, said:

“Two modes only were known to the common law to re-examine such facts, lo wit: The granting of a new trial by the court where the issue was tried, or to which the record was returnable; or, secondly, by the award of a venire facias de novo by an appellate court for some error of law which intervened in the proceedings. All suits which are not of equity or admiralty jurisdiction. whatever may be the peculiar form which they may assume to settle legal rights, are embraced in that provision. It means not merely suits which the common law recognized among its settled proceedings, but all suits in which legal rights are to be determined in that modes in contradistinction to equitable rights and to cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, and it does not refer to the particular form of procedure which may be adopted.”

As a jury trial was- demanded by the claimant in this case, and as such trial was had, the appeal taken in case No. 3,024 must be dis[328]*328missed, because such method is inappropriate to review the proceedings had. -It is so ordered.

At the trial the charge of adulteration was abandoned by the government, and it relied solely and alone on the charge of misbranding. As has been seen, at the conclusion of the evidence the court charged the jury neither of the labels under which the cases of molasses were sold and shipped from Memphis to Tittle Rock was misleading, nor constituted a misbranding, as that term is employed in the act, nor in regulation 17 promulgated by' the Secretaries under authority of the act. This action of the court constitutes the sole ground of error relied upon to work a reversal of the judgment rendered in the case.

The only evidence .adduced on the trial was that of the marshal who executed the writ of seizure and that of Geo. B. Spencer, a government chemist from the Department of Agriculture. The marshal testified the cases of molasses seized by him bore labels identical with those attached to .and made part of the answer of claimant, which- labels were offered and received in evidence at the trial, as Exhibits A and B, and are in the form annexed.

The witness Spencer testified he made a chemical analysis of the' brands of molasses seized in this case; that the sugar glen brand contained 30 per cent, and the burro brand 40 per cent, of commercial glucose; that pure molasses contains no commercial glucose, but does contain natural, glucose; that neither natural nor commercial glucose is injurious or deleterious to health; that a large number of syrups on the market contain as high as 80 per cent, or 90 per cent, commercial glucose; that according to the practice and rulings of the Bureau of -Chemistry of the Department of Agriculture the labeling or branding of commercial glucose as “made from corn syrup” is permissible.

The provisions of the act prescribing what shall constitute a mis-branding, within its meaning as applied to food products, are as follows :

“If it be labeled or branded so as to deceive or mislead -the purchaser.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
174 F. 325, 1909 U.S. App. LEXIS 5184, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-seven-hundred-seventy-nine-cases-of-molasses-ca8-1909.