139 F. 1 | 2d Cir. | 1905
There is no question as to the classification of the articles, which contain alcohol, and are imported from France, but only whether in determining the proper market value the appraiser was warranted in making certain additions to
“The laws of this country in the assessment of duties proceed upon the market value in the exporting country, and not upon that market value less suck remission or amelioration as that country chooses to allow in accordance with its own views of public policy.”
In the case at bar the revenue taxes imposed under the Trench law are (1) a general tax on alcohol consumed in Trance, which is the same throughout the entire country; (2) at Bordeaux (from which city came the importations in this case) a special tax for the benefit of the city of Bordeaux; (3) the “octroi” duty on alcohol sold or consumed in the city of Bordeaux. The first of these taxes is not collected in case of exportation, but is uniform throughout Trance, in whatever part of that country the alcohol is consumed. The importer concedes that under the Passavant Case, supra, this tax may be added t.o make market value. The other two taxes, “droit de ville” and “octroi,” are not collected in case of importation. Moreover, whenever the alcohol is removed from the city of Bordeaux to any other part of Prance, the “droit de ville” and “octroi” of that city are remitted, since they are purely local taxes imposed for the benefit of the particular town or city, which has in some way obtained the right to tax articles consumed within its boundaries for its own individual benefit. If articles which have been withdrawn from Bordeaux come into the jurisdiction of some other city or town, which has itself the right to levy “octroi” or “droit de ville,” they become subject thereto if they be consumed there, but if they are again removed these taxes are remitted. If they come into some part of Prance which has no right to impose these local taxes, and are there consumed, no tax other than the general one is imposed upon them. It appears also from the findings of the Board of General Appraisers, which are printed in Rheinstrom v. U. S. (C. C.) 118 Fed. 303, that these local taxes vary with the locality, the percentage of octroi in some places (as Paris) being as low as 4.76 francs for every hundred inhabitants,
The function of the appraiser is to ascertain “the actual market value and wholesale. price of the merchandise, * * * in the principal .markets of the country from which the same has been imported.” Act June 10, 1890, c. 407, § 10, 26 Stat. 136 [U. S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 1922]. Some value prevailing generally in the foreign country — not some varying local value prevailing in some of its individual cities — seems to have been contemplated by the statute. We concur with the board in the conclusion that these special taxes, being purely local, and lacking uniformity throughout the foreign country from which they come, cannot be properly .considered as a certain or fixed element of market value in the markets of that country, especially since it appears that there are markets in that country where neither octroi nor droit de ville is levied.
The decision of the Circuit Court is affirmed.