77 F. 744 | 9th Cir. | 1896
Lead Opinion
The steamship Coquitlam, with a cargo of 6,190 fur seal skins and some supplies, was seized by the United States revenue cutter Corwin at or near Port Etches, in the territory of Alaska, on June 22, 1892, and was taken by the cutter to Sitka, and turned over to the collector of customs. On the 5th day of July, following, the United States district attorney for the district of Alaska filed in the district court o'f that territory an information for the seizure of said vessel and her cargo, and the forfeiture of the same, for alleged violations of the provisions of the revenue statutes of the United States. The libel of information contains four counts. The first count alleges, in substance, that on-or about June 19, 1892, within the limits of the Alaska collection district, and within four leagues of the coast of said district, near the island of Afognak, there
The answer of the Union Steamship Company, Limited, of Vancouver, British Columbia, the owner and claimant of the Coquitlam, admits the transfers of fur seal skins as alleged in the first and third counts of the libel, but denies that any of said schooners were bound to the United States, or that any of said merchandise was from a foreign port, or was bound to the United States, or that any of said transfers were made within the district of Alaska, or within four leagues of the coast. Answering the second count, the claimant denies that the merchandise was unladen from the schooners, or received into the steamer within the collection district of Alaska, or within the waters of the United States, or within four leagues of any part of the coast of the United States; and, answering the fourth count, it denies that any of the merchandise whatever on board the steamship was subject to duty; and it denies that any merchandise was brought into the United States on said steamship in violation of the provisions of the Revised
The answer of the owners of the cargo is similar in purport to the answer of the claimant of the steamship, but in meeting the allegations of the fourth count, whereby it is sought to forfeit the cargo, it alleges as follows: “That the whole of said cargo belonged and was consigned to the several owners thereof, as hereinbefore stated; and no portion thereof belonged or was consigned to the master, mate, officers, or crew of the said steamship Coquitlam; and no portion of the said cargo of seal skins and merchandise and supplies hereinbefore referred to was destined to any port or place in the United States, nor for any citizen or person residing in the United States.”
The facts as shown by the record, and which are not disputed, are as follows: The sealing schooners mentioned in the first count of the libel cleared from Victoria, in British Columbia, about the 1st day of March, 1892, on fishing and sealing voyages to the North Pacific Ocean. They were all foreign vessels, duly registered at some port in the dominion of Canada, and were all duly licensed for said voyages. They all had the usual ships’ supplies and stores and outfit for seal fishing. They all had clearance papers, such as are usual with vessels bound on like voyages, and the papers disclosed the nature and purpose of the voyages, and declared that the vessels were bound to the North Pacific Ocean, for the purpose of engaging in seal hunting and fishing, thence to return to their respective ports of clearance. Their owners belonged to an association known as the Pacific Sealers’ Association. When these vessels embarked upon their voyages, it had not been determined whether the modus vivendi for the regulation of seal hunting, which had been proclaimed in May, 1891, for the period of one year, would be renewed for the following year; but after it became known, in the spring of 1892, that it would be renewed, the steamer Coquitlam was fitted out at the port of Victoria, by the Pacific Sealers’ Association, for the purpose of taking supplies to the schooners, and of bringing back the skins that had been tak'en during
Upon the trial of the cause, the claimants endeavored to prove by the testimony of the masters of the schooners that, before the transfer of cargoes began, the vessels had proceeded out to sea a distance of more than four leagues from the shore, and that, consequently, the acts complained of took place beyond the jurisdiction of the United States. Upon this question the testimony is conflicting. It has been found by the district court that the transfers took place at about seven miles from the shore. In the light of the evidence, which we have carefully considered, together with
The principal contention on the appeal concerns the first and the third counts, which charge the. violation of sections 2867 and 2868 of the Revised Statutes, which provide as follows:
“Sec. 2867. If after the arrival of any vessel laden with merchandise and bound to the United States, within the limits of any collection district, or within four leagues of the coast any part of the cargo of such vessel shall be unladen, for any purpose whatever, before such vessel has*490 come to the proper place for the discharge of her cargo, or some part thereof, and has been there duly authorized by. the proper officer of the customs to unlade the same, the master of such vessel and the mate, or other person next in command, shall respectively be liable to a penalty of one thousand dollars for each such offense, and the merchandise so unladen shall be forfeited, except in case of some unavoidable accident, necessity, or distress of weather. In case of such unavoidable accident, necessity, or distress, the master of such vessel shall give notice to, and, together with two or more of the officers or mariners on board such • vessel, of whom the mate or other person next in command shall be one, shall make proof upon oath before the collector, or other chief officer of the customs of the district, within the limits of which such accident, necessity, or distress happened, or before the collector, or other chief officer of the collection district, within the limits of which such vessel shall first afterward arrive, if the accident, necessity, or distress happened not within the limits of any district, but within four leagues of the coast of the United States. The collector, or other chief officer, is hereby authorized and required to administer such oath.
“Sec. 2868. If any merchandise, so unladen from on board any such vessel, shall be put or received into any other vessel, except in the case of such accident, necessity, or distress, to be so notified and proved, the master of any such vessel into which the nierchandise shall be so put and received, and every other person aiding and assisting therein, shall be liable to a penalty of treble the value of the merchandise, and the vessel in which they shall be so put shall be forfeited.”
Section 2867 contemplates the arrival of a vessel laden with merchandise, “and bound to the United States,” and its penalty is denounced against the unlading of the cargo of such vessel before it has arrived at the proper place for the discharge thereof, and has been authorized to do so by the proper officers of the customs. Has the penalty been incurred by the unlading of the cargoes of the schooners into the Coquitlam? The schooners, as we have seen, were foreign vessels, which had cleared from their home ports to engage in sealing and fishing in the North Pacific Ocean,
In Harrison v. Vose, 9 How. 372, the meaning of the term “arrival,” as applied to a vessel, was considered by the supreme court. The case was an action for a penalty imposed by the act of February 28, 1803 (2 Stat. 203), for not depositing with the consul of the United States at Kingston, Jamaica, the register of a vessel. The vessel belonged to citizens of the United States. She sailed from her home port with a cargo of lumber, consigned to merchants of Kingston. She arrived in the harbor of Kingston, and came to anchor at about a quarter of a mile from the town, but did not go up to the town, nor come to an entry, nor discharge any part of her cargo, nor take in cargo or passengers, nor do any business, except to communicate with her consignees. The act declared: “That it shall be the duty of every master or commander of a ship or vessel belonging to citizens of the United States, * * * on his arrival at a foreign port, to deposit his register, sea letter, and Mediterranean passport with the consul, vice consul, commercial agent, or vice commercial agent, if any there be at such port.”
In U. S. v. Shackford, 5 Mason, 445, Fed.Cas.No. 16, 262, it was attempted to recover a penalty against the master of a vessel for not delivering up a temporary register within 10 days after her arrival within the district to which she belonged. The vessel belonged to Eastport, and was there enrolled and licensed. She proceeded from her home port to New York, where she took a temporary register, and sailed on a voyage to St. Johns, New Brunswick, where she landed her cargo, and took a return cargo and passengers for New York. On her way to the latter place, she stopped at Eastport, in American waters, anchored off the town, and waited about two hours for the tide, during which period she landed some passengers and their baggage, and took on board some other passengers and small stores, and then proceeded to New York. She did not deliver up her temporary register to the collector of the district within which she belonged. Story, J., in determining whether, under the facts, there was an arrival of the vessel within the district of Eastport, in the sense of the act, so that the penalty was incurred, said of the term “arrival”: “It may be used in the most general sense, as importing a mere entry within the local limits of the district, or it may be restrained to such an entry as is purely voluntary, for objects connected with the voyage, and a part of the enterprise. Whether the one sense or the other is to be adopted depends upon a just survey of the language, and the policy of the statute. * * * In cases of this sort (and many such may be imagined), it is easy to see, if a rigid construction be adopted, that great embarrassments, if not material injuries, may arise to merchants and owners,
In The Cargo ex Lady Essex, 39 F. 767, a case in which a vessel had been stranded by stress of weather, within the limits of a collection district, Brown, J., said: “It is clear that there was no arrival of the Victor, within the meaning of section 2867, since ca vessel is not considered to arrive, so as to be regarded as importing her cargo, unless she arrives within a port, and with an intent to enter her cargo.’ Harrison v. Vose, 9 How. 381. It is not enough that she comes within the limits of the district. U. S. v. Vowell, 5 Cranch, 372.”
It has been settled by the almost unanimous concurrence of the decisions that the penalties imposed for violations of the general revenue laws are to receive a fair and reasonable construction; that such laws are not penal, in the sense which requires them to be strictly construed, but that
In view of these principles and the facts of this case, we cannot say that the schooners arrived within the waters of the United States, or that they were bound to the United States. The words “and bound to the United States” must be given their reasonable meaning. If it had been intended in the statute to prescribe a penalty for the unlading of the cargo of a foreign vessel merely upon her arrival within the waters of the United States, irrespective of the purpose for which she entered those waters, it is evident that the words “and bound to the United States” would have no place in the statute. It is not every casual- arrival of a vessel within the waters of the United States, and the unlading of a portion of her cargo within such waters, therefore, that comes within the prohibition of the statute. The vessel must also be one bound to the United States, for the purposes of her voyage. The unlading must be of a cargo which is destined to the United States, and to be there discharged. This is contemplated in the words of the statute which confine the penalty to an unlading “before such vessel has come to the proper place for the discharge of her cargo or some part thereof.” It is not contended that any injury has been done to the United States by the acts which are complained of in the libel, or that the United States has in any way been defrauded of revenue, or that there was an intention upon the part of the masters or owners of any of the vessels to evade the provisions of the revenue laws. The merchandise was not bound to the United States, nor was it consigned to any person, nor destined to be delivered at any place in the United States. But it is contended that the policy and spirit of the law has been broken by the transfers of the merchandise within the waters of the United States, without permission from
In the case of Jackson v. U. S., 4 Mason, 186, Fed.Cas. No.7,149, Story, J., in deciding whether a coasting vessel, having on board goods which have not paid duties, is within the purview of the fiftieth section of the revenue act of 1799, as to landing foreign goods without a permit, said:
“I am aware that this view of the act leaves the revenue system exposed to great frauds, and that if coasting vessels are. exempted, under like circumstances, from obtaining permits, there is great probability that the revenue will suffer to an alarming extent by a very easy, and at the same time a very mischievous, process. The remedy, however, lies with congress, and not with courts of law.”
The second count of the libel seeks to forfeit the steamship for violation of section 3109 of the Revised Statutes (19 U.S.C.A. § 275 note)-. That section provides as follows: “Sec. 3109. The master of any foreign vessel, laden or in ballast, arriving in the waters of the United States from any foreign territory adjacent to the northern, northeastern, or northwestern frontiers of the United .States, shall report at the office of any collector or deputy collector of the customs, which shall be nearest to the point at which sueh vessel may enter such waters; and such vessel shall not proceed farther inland, either to unlade or take in cargo, without a special permit from such collector or deputy collector, issued under and in accordance with such general or special regulations as the secretary of the treasury may in his discretion, from time to time, prescribe. For any violation of this section such vessel shall be seized and forfeited.”
There is here imposed upon the master of any foreign vessel, arriving under the conditions mentioned in the statute, the duty of reporting at the office of any collector or
The fourth count alleges the violation of Rev.St. §§ 2806, 2807, 2809. The first of those sections provides that no merchandise shall be brought into the United States from any foreign port, in any vessel, unless the master has on board manifests in writing of the cargo, signed by such master. Section 2807 prescribes what the manifest shall contain. Section 2809 imposes the penalty for violation of the two preceding sections, and declares that “the master shall be liable to a penalty equal to the value of such' merchandise not included in such manifest, and all such merchandise not included in the manifest, belonging or consigned to the master, mate, officers or crew of such vessel, shall be forfeited.” There is no attempt upon the part of the United States to impose a penalty upon the master for violation of these statutes. It is sought by the libel to forfeit the merchandise only. • The statute makes forfeitable only such merchandise as is consigned to the master, mate, officers, or crew. It is not alleged in the libel that any of the merchandise was so consigned. This would be an es
Concurrence Opinion
(concurring).
A careful review and consideration of the facts of this case convince me that the finding of the district court “that on the 19th day of June, 1892, within the United States, in the collection district of Alaska, and within the waters thereof, within four leagues of the coast of Alaska, and within the jurisdiction of this court,” the cargoes of the various vessels were transferred to the Coquitlam, is not sustained by the evidence; and I therefore concur in the judgment of reversal. On the other points decided by the majority of the court I express no opinion.