Bowers v. United States

• Decision Date: 01 December 1955
• Docket Number: No. 15275.,15275.
• Citation: 226 F.2d 424
• Parties: Lamar BOWERS, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

226 F.2d 424 (1955)

Lamar BOWERS, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Appellee.

No. 15275.

United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit.

October 26, 1955.

Rehearing Denied December 1, 1955.

W. H. Albritton, Andalusia, Ala., Albrittons & Rankin, Andalusia, Ala., of counsel, for appellant.

Hartwell Davis, U. S. Atty., Neil Brooks, Associate Solicitor, Donald A. Campbell, Washington, D. C., J. Stephen Doyle, Jr., Special Asst. to the Atty. Gen., Howard Rooney, U. S. Dept. of

Agriculture, Washington, D. C., for appellee.

Before HUTCHESON, Chief Judge, and TUTTLE and CAMERON, Circuit Judges.

HUTCHESON, Chief Judge.

The suit was for the collection of penalties assessed against the defendant under Section 1359(a) of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938, as amended,¹ because of his failure to account for the disposition of peanuts raised by him in the years 1950-1951.

The claim was: that appellant in 1950 and 1951 engaged in the production of peanuts on his farm, and harvested in excess of his farm acreage allotments; that he failed and refused to comply with a written request from the State Committee to account for the disposition of the peanuts; and that thereupon and because thereof he became subject to and was assessed the penalties for which plaintiff sues.

Defendant filed a motion to dismiss on several grounds. One was that the complaint was deficient in that it failed to charge that he had marketed, sold, or otherwise disposed of any peanuts harvested by him during either 1950 or 1951 from his farm, in such manner or under such conditions as to make him subject to any lawful penalty imposed by Title 7 U.S.C.A. § 1359.

Another was that the provision of Sec. 1359(a), Title 7 U.S.C.A., under which the penalty was allegedly assessed, "If any producer * * * fails to account for the disposition of any peanuts, an amount of peanuts equal to the normal yield of the number of acres harvested in excess of the farm acreage allotment shall be deemed to have been marketed in excess of the marketing quota for the farm, and the penalty in respect thereof shall be paid and remitted by the producer", either created a rebuttable presumption of fact, that plaintiff had marketed excess peanuts, which defendant's evidence had rebutted, or it attempted, in violation of the Constitution, to establish an irrebuttable presumption of fact, that defendant had marketed excess peanuts, and was invalid.

In the alternative, defendant moved for a summary judgment on the ground that there was no genuine issue as to any material fact and in support attached the affidavit of himself and his wife to the effect that, while defendant had planted and raised peanuts in 1950 with the idea that if he were allowed to market any of them he would do so, and in 1951 with the knowledge that he would not be allowed to do so, his primary purpose in planting them in each of the years was to use them for feed for his livestock and when in each year he was unable to market any, he did use all of them for feed.

Plaintiff, on its part, filed requests for admissions under Rule 36, Fed.Rules Civ. Proc. 28 U.S.C.A., and the defendant admitting: that he did, as claimed by plaintiff, plant and harvest peanuts from his farm in excess of his acreage allotment; that in each of the years he had received a request from the marketing committee for a written report of his production; that he had not complied with the request; that he was notified that penalties had been assessed against him; and that he had not paid the penalties; plaintiff moved for summary judgment. Thereupon the district judge granted the motion and, filing findings of fact and conclusions of law, 123 F.Supp. 184, 185,² entered a judgment assessing the penalties as prayed.

Appealing from that judgment appellant, in his brief, thus states his position:

"A. The District Court erred in rendering the Summary Judgment in favor of Appellee. It is based solely on —

"(a) The admission by Appellant that he failed to account for the disposition of his peanut crop, in writing, to the Production and Marketing Committee, and

"(b) The provision of Sec. 1359, Title 7 U.S.C.A. that: `If any producer * * * fails to account for the disposition of any peanuts, an amount of peanuts equal to the normal yield of the number of acres harvested in excess of the farm acreage allotment shall be deemed to have been marketed in excess of the marketing quota for the farm, and the penalty in respect thereof shall be paid and remitted by the producer.\'

"Without regard for the actual fact that the peanuts were not `marketed\' and, that Appellant did not in any manner dispose of the peanuts by voluntary or involuntary sale, barter, exchange, or by gift inter vivos, but in actual fact used them for his own seed and feed for his own livestock. Hence the judgment must rest upon the holding that the quoted provision of Sec. 1359 either created (1) a substantive rule of law, or (2) an absolute, irrebuttable presumption of fact. Appellant respectfully submits that —

"1. The quoted provision of Sec. 1359 did not create a substantive rule of law, and

"2. A conclusive, irrebuttal presumption of fact violates the Fifth Amendment and Art. III of the Constitution of the United States of America.

"3. If the Section did attempt to create a substantive rule of law, Congress did not intend the rule to apply to farmers producing peanuts for domestic, or farm consumption, but

"4. If Congress did intend to create a substantive rule of law applicable to farmers producing peanuts for domestic, or farm consumption, such rule would be unconstitutional and void as being beyond the powers of Congress under Art. I, Sec. 8 of and in contravention of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America."

Proceeding, then, to argue in turn each of his four points against the judgment, appellant has managed by his earnestness in presenting, his diligence in developing, and his skill in supporting his points to invest the question underlying decision here, a question which on its face seems to us quite simple, the answer to it quite plain and clear, with an appearance of difficulty and complexity and to impart to his argument an impressiveness which has convinced the court as a whole of his complete sincerity and his confidence in the correctness of his views, and has evoked from one member of the court a dissent in support of them.

Impressed, however, as we might be with the contentions of appellant and the arguments and authorities³ marshaled in their support, if we could agree with his views that the statute under construction means what and operates as appellant claims it does, we are constrained to declare: that in our opinion the language of the statute, note 1, supra, under the authority of which the penalties were assessed and recovered, is simple and clear in its terms and meaning and wholly free from the defects, constitutional or otherwise, with which appellant charges it; and that the penalties provided for in the statute and exacted in this case were based not, as defendant claims, upon his having marketed peanuts but simply and entirely upon his failure to account for their disposition. Without, then, joining issue with appellant on his arguments or discussing the authorities he cites in support of the unfounded assumptions he makes, we reject his propositions, arguments, and authorities as wholly inapplicable here. Rejecting his contention, that the quoted provisions of Sec. 1359(a) did not declare a substantive rule of law but merely created a presumption of fact, we particularly affirm to the contrary: that the language under review "an amount of peanuts * * * shall be deemed to have been marketed in excess of the marketing quota for the farm and the penalty in respect thereof shall be paid and remitted by the producer" was intended to operate not as a presumption of fact rebuttable or otherwise, but as the statement of a substantive rule of law, the meaning, purpose and effect of which was to lay down as a rule of law that the penalty imposed for the failure to account for the disposition of the peanuts to be collected from the producer was the same as that the statute provided for excess marketing. In short, we find ourselves in complete agreement with the findings and conclusions of the district judge and with the contentions of the appellee as to the purpose and effect of the statute as they are thus set out in its brief:

"I. The Act and the regulations require each producer of peanuts to account for the disposition of all peanuts produced by such person. The appellant failed to make such accounting and is liable for civil penalties.

"A. The appellant admits that he failed to make the required accounting.

"B. The statutory and regulatory provisions require each producer of peanuts to account for the disposition of all peanuts produced by such person. * * *

"C. The Act creates an irrebuttable presumption; i. e. a rule of substantive law, that failure to account for the disposition of all peanuts produced subjects the producer to the penalty provisions."⁴

"II. The provisions of the Act are constitutional.

"A. The creation of an irrebuttable presumption; i. e. a rule of substantive law that failure to account for the disposition of all peanuts produced subjects the producer to the penalty provisions, is not violative of the Constitution.

* * * * * *

"C. The statutory requirement for producers to account for the disposition of all peanuts produced by them is within the scope of the commerce clause in the Constitution."⁵

If we are correct in these views, and we are not in any doubt that we are, then the whole argument of appellant falls for it is untenably based upon the view: that the act or omission penalized in this case was not the failure to report on the disposition of the peanuts as the statute provides and as the complaint charged but that failure coupled with proof that the peanuts had been...