Dario Sanchez v. United States

• Decision Date: 19 May 1958
• Docket Number: No. 5304.,5304.
• Parties: Ruben DARIO SANCHEZ, Defendant, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

256 F.2d 73 (1958)

Ruben DARIO SANCHEZ, Defendant, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Appellee.

No. 5304.

United States Court of Appeals First Circuit.

May 19, 1958.

Santos P. Amadeo, Rio Piedros, P. R., and Gerardo Ortiz del Rivero, San Juan, P. R., on brief for appellant.

Ruben Rodriguez-Antongiorgi, U. S. Atty., and Francisco A. Gil, Jr., Asst. U. S. Atty., San Juan, P. R., on brief for appellee.

Juan B. Fernandez Badillo, Atty. Gen., Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Arturo Estrella, Asst. Atty. Gen., Abe Fortas, Washington, D. C., and Jose Trias Monge, San Juan, P. R., on brief for the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico as amicus curiae.

Before MAGRUDER, Chief Judge, and WOODBURY and STALEY, Circuit Judges.

MAGRUDER, Chief Judge.

The appeal is from an order of the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico entered August 16, 1957, denying a motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 to vacate four separate judgments of conviction and sentence imposed for various narcotics violations under the Narcotic Drugs Import and Export Act, 21 U.S.C.A. § 171 et seq. and under the Marihuana Tax Act as now embodied in the Federal Revenue Code, 26 U.S.C. § 2590 et seq.

At our session in San Juan on February 7, 1958, the case was submitted to us without oral argument on the record and briefs and on the arguments in Moreno Rios v. United States, 1 Cir., 256 F.2d 68. The decision of this court handed down today in the Moreno case is controlling in the case at bar so far as concerns the applicability to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico of the provisions of the Federal Narcotic Drugs Import and Export Act. Certain further comments are necessary because of additional issues present in this case.

As to the Marihuana Act, this was passed by Congress under the taxing power. If applicable to Puerto Rico, it applies there in the same way it applies to the States of the Union. But under the guise of exercising the taxing power, the Act makes criminal certain transactions in marihuana entirely local in nature without reference to whether the marihuana had been previously imported. Some day we may have to decide whether such an exercise of the taxing power by the Congress is inconsistent with the local autonomy vested in the Commonwealth Government by Public Law 600 (64 Stat. 319, 48 U.S.C.A. § 731b et seq.) and by the ensuing Constitution adopted by the people of Puerto Rico. Cf. United States v. Figueroa Rios, D.C.D.P.R.1956, 140 F.Supp. 376; Trigo Bros. Packing Corp. v. Davis, D.C.D.P.R.1958, 159 F. Supp. 841. We do not have that problem here, because Puerto Rico has clearly manifested consent to this exercise of power.

In United States v. Marquez Estrada, an unreported opinion entered December 21, 1956, the court below had before it this question of the applicability of the Marihuana Act to the Commonwealth, and it found consent in the referendum by the people of Puerto Rico in which they accepted the terms of the "compact" offered to them by Public Law 600. As we pointed out in the Moreno case, that "compact" left in force as a term of the Puerto Rican Federal Relations Act a provision of § 9 of the Organic Act of 1917, as amended, which reads in part as follows: "The statutory laws of the United States not locally inapplicable, except as hereinbefore or hereinafter otherwise provided, shall have the same force and effect in Puerto Rico as in the United States, except the internal revenue laws other than those contained in the Philippine Trade Act of 1946". (48 U.S.C.A. § 734, 60 Stat. 158) The argument is that, since the Marihuana Act undoubtedly applied to Puerto Rico prior to the creation of the Commonwealth, and since its application in Puerto Rico is the same as its application in the states, the people of Puerto Rico by accepting the terms of the compact have in effect ratified the future application of the Marihuana Act to Puerto Rico. But it may be urged that § 9 of the Organic Act, as thus continued in effect, contained an exception to the "internal revenue laws"; and therefore that the people of Puerto Rico by ratifying the "compact" have not thereby consented to the purely local application of this taxing act. To this argument an answer is possible that the Marihuana Act, as embodied in the Internal Revenue Code, is only in form an internal revenue act, but in greater part is a regulatory measure, with the raising of revenue only subordinate and incidental. See United States v. Sanchez, 1950, 340 U.S. 42, 44, 71 S.Ct. 108, 95 L.Ed. 47.

But we do not need to rely upon the foregoing line of thought, for the consent of Puerto Rico to the local application of the Marihuana Act has otherwise been unequivocally manifested.

As we pointed out in the Moreno case, from the time of its original enactment in 1937 the Congress had the clear intention to apply the Marihuana Tax Act to Puerto Rico. This intention persisted when the Congress in 1939 incorporated the provisions of the Marihuana Tax Act into the Internal Revenue Code. And even when the Congress came to revise the Revenue Code in 1954, 26 U.S.C. § 4741 et seq., which was after the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico came into being, it is clear that the Congress expressed a definite intention that the Act should continue to be applicable in that area. Pursuant to § 2603 of the Internal Revenue Code (53 Stat. 283), the administration of the Marihuana Act in Puerto Rico, including the collection of the special taxes and the issuance of the order forms, is delegated to the appropriate internal revenue officer of that government. The Puerto Rican Government undertook the execution of this task of administration, and there has been complete liaison and cooperation between the federal and Puerto Rican officers having to do with narcotics enforcement legislation. No conflict has arisen as between the administration of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, where whatever revenue is raised goes to the Puerto Rican Treasury, and the Puerto Rican...