Saxonville Mills v. Russell

| U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts | May 15, 1870

LOWELL, District Judge.

The general rule, as established by the statutes for finding dutiable, value, is to take the value in the principal markets of the country of exportation, and to add the charges incurred to get the goods on board ship. The cost, of packing is sometimes one of these charges, as in Barnard v. Morton [Case No. 1.005]. In other instances it forms a part of the price of the article, being itself of no value, as in Harding v. Whitney [Case No. 6,052], Either way it is commonly a part of the dutiable value of the poods. This statute, however, excludes the charges at the last port, and I am much inclined to think that it is to be fairly inferred from the agreed facts that the baling is one of those charges. This point is not perfectly clear upon the evidence, and I therefore pass to the next.

Assuming that the cost of the article as bought included the cost of the hides, I am of opinion that the weight of the hides ought not to be rejected in ascertaining what the wool cost per pound. The allowance for tare in assessing specific duties, is made for the very purpose of avoiding the injustice of requiring taxes to be paid on what is or ao value, and stands on the same reason as tne like allowance between buyer and seller. Here there was no such allowance between the parties, because the covering was of equal value with its contents. If the weight of the covering is rejected as tare, the government loses the duty on an article of value. It is true that in this particular instance the government would gain more than it would lose; but the rule must be uniform, and I apprehend that a shrewd importer might easily work such a rule to the great injury of the revenue. There is no question here of fraud, or of putting a fictitious value on the coverings in order to lessen the nominal value of the wool. The case finds that the wool whether baled or un-baled was worth less than twelve cents a pound, and that the additional cost of the wool when baled was due to the intrinsic value of the hides, and not to the expense of putting them on.

Under these circumstances the collector ought to assess the hides for their appropriate duty as articles of merchandise, but not, at the same time, to reject them as tare. Or if the importers do not object, it is easier and of some advantage to the revenue, to follow the former practice of assessing the whole as wool. Judgment for the plaintiffs.