United States v. Sheldon & Co.

2 Ct. Cust. 485, 1912 WL 19414, 1912 CCPA LEXIS 34
CourtCourt of Customs and Patent Appeals
DecidedFebruary 1, 1912
DocketNo. 494
StatusPublished
Cited by33 cases

This text of 2 Ct. Cust. 485 (United States v. Sheldon & Co.) 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. Sheldon & Co., 2 Ct. Cust. 485, 1912 WL 19414, 1912 CCPA LEXIS 34 (ccpa 1912).

Opinions

De Vries, Judge,

delivered the opinion of the court;

This case concerns an importation from southern France and Spain of merchandise returned by the appraiser and assessed by the collector at the port of Chicago as “gum resin” advanced in value or condition, as provided in paragraph 20 of the tariff act of 1909.

[486]*486It is claimed by the importer to be entitled to free entry under paragraph 559 of said act as “gum resin crude, not advanced in value or condition by any process or treatment whatever beyond that essential to the proper packing of the drugs and the prevention of decay or deterioration pending manufacture.”

Other claims which we deem irrelevant are made.

The'- imported article is the' well known translucent, compact, brittle, pulverizable rosin of commerce imported in barrels.

It is agreed by both parties to the action, and seems to have been considered in the commerce of-the country for many years, that this article is a gum resin. Confirmation of this from 1884, at least, to date will be found in T. D. 6694; G. A. 1528 (T. D. 12977); G. A. 3063 (T. D. 16099); G. A. 3133 (T. D. 16304); G. A. 3892 (T. D. 18090), and the record.

This controversy concerns the single question whether, or not, such resin so. imported has been “advanced in value or condition by any process or treatment whatever from the condition of a crude drug to a condition beyond that essential to the proper packing of the drug and prevention of decay or deterioration pending manufacture.”

While the merchandise was produced in southern France and Spain; the testimony in the record is almost wholly devoted to the methods of production of resin or rosin in this country.

The terms “resin” and “rosin” seem to be used,- commercially at least, interchangeably.

The method of production abroad is set forth in a certificate duly authenticated and admitted in evidence. It recites:

The raw rosin or "gemme’' (gum of trees) is harvested in pots placed near the lower part of incisions made in seaside pines.
This matter, which contains a certain proportion of water- and- impurities, such as wood shavings, pine needles, and insec’ts, is brought in barrels to the works, which are located near the place of production.
Such works consist of boilers, used for the purpose of melting the “gemme” (gum of trees) in order to remove thereform all the impurities contained therein, and of stills (alembics) of various systems for extracting by means of distillation the oil of turpentine which the “gemme” (gum of trees or resin) contains. The residuum left from said distillation leaves then the still (alembic), passes through sieves and forms the so-called colophony or rosin (“Brái”).
Its color is clear during the first months of the harvest, April, May, and June, and it becomes dark during- the end of the campaign in the months of October and November.
The colophony is thereupon placed in barrels of pine wood which contain, in general, 3'to 400 kilograms of matter.

The most detailed, as well as probably the most accurate, description of the process of the production of resin is found in Spons’ Encyclopaedia (vol. 3, p. 1680):

Rosin or Colophony and Rosin-oil. — The several kinds of rosin, colophony, or resin proper are the solid residues obtained by the distillation of the turpentine. The crude turpentine or oleo-resin is submitted to aqueous distillation in a copper [487]*487vessel, in place of the old-fashioned iron still which produced a red-coloured oil. The still * * * is charged with crude oleo-resin in the early morning; heat is applied * * * until the mass attains a uniform temperature of 100°-158°. * * * The distillation continues, a mixture of water and turpentine-oil passing over into a wooden separating-tub; * * * when the liquid shows 9 parts of water to 1 part of turpentine-oil, the distillation is stopped, the still-cap is removed, and the hot rosin remaining in a fluid condition in the still is drawn off hy a tap near the bottom, and passed through a fine strainer into a vat, whence it is baled by long-handled wooden buckets into barrels for sale.
The grade of rosin depends (1) upon the quality of the crude oleo-resin uuder treatment, and (2) upon the skill with which the operation is conducted.

In Thorpe’s Dictionary of Applied Chemistry (vol. 3, p. 343), article “Resins; Colophony,” it is stated;

Colophony. — Colophony is the residue which remains after the volatile oil Iras been removed by distillation from the oleo-resins, the crude turpentine which exude from the various species of coniferae. It varies somewhat, according as it is derived from the one or the other species, and with the method employed for its production. The browner resins are mostly of-American origin, * * * rvhile those of a lighter colour come by way of Bordeaux, being the yield of * * * an inhabitant of the districts of Lahdes and the Gironde. It varies in colour from pale amber to dark red-brown.

These described processes of the production of the resin of commerce differ in no substantial particular from those described by the several witnesses in this record.

There is no controversy that the material which first exudes from the trees and is caught in' the receptacles is an oleoresin generally known as “crude turpentine”; that the distillation process employed, to which this oleoresin or crude turpentine is subjected, vaporizes the turpentine in the oleoresin, whereupon it alone passes through the worm of the still, is cooled, condensed, and collected in receptacles-The heat applied by this process is not sufficient to vaporize and therefore distil the rosin content of the oleoresin, but melts it sufficiently only to permit of the escape of the turpentine. By and as a part of the same process the residue of the oleoresin in the still is let off through strainers .into a vat. The straining is but a minor incidental part of the process of separating the two contents of the •oleoresin. Before it cools it is deposited in barrels, where by the action of the air it becomes hardened. The products of this operation are turpentine and the resin or rosin .of commerce. The turpentine has been distilled, in that it has been vaporized, passed through the worm of the still, and then condensed. The rosin content has been heated, but not distilled or vaporized, and in being run off from the boiler of the still into a vat is passed through screens which take therefrom the chips, barks, insects, and dirt which accumulate therein in the reclamation of the oleoresin from the trunk of the tree. It is then deposited in the kegs of commerce. In this condition, as thus [488]*488deposited in the kegs of commerce, so far as this record shows, it in no sense differs in the slightest particular from its condition as found in the trunk of the tree. Nor does it differ in the slightest degree from its condition during any step of its processing from the tree to the barrels of commerce save that it is separated by heating from the turpentine in one instance, and separated by screening from dirt and chips in the other instance. It has had no process applied thereto, save that of heating to permit the.

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Bluebook (online)
2 Ct. Cust. 485, 1912 WL 19414, 1912 CCPA LEXIS 34, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-sheldon-co-ccpa-1912.