Schlesinger v. Beard Same v. United States

• Decision Date: 31 January 1887
• Citation: 30 L.Ed. 656,120 U.S. 264,7 S.Ct. 546
• Parties: SCHLESINGER and another, Copartners, etc., v. BEARD, Collector of Customs. 1 SAME v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

120 U.S. 264

7 S.Ct. 546

30 L.Ed. 656

SCHLESINGER and another, Copartners, etc., v. BEARD, Collector of Customs.¹

SAME

v. UNITED STATES.

January 31, 1887.

L. S. Dabney and W. S. Hall, for plaintiffs in error.

Sol Gen. Jenks, for defendants in error.

WAITE, C. J.

These cases involve substantially the same questions, and may be considered together. One is a suit by Naylor & Co., importers, against Beard, the collector of customs in Boston, to recover back duties alleged to have been illegally exacted, and the other is a suit by the United States against the same importers to recover additional duties assessed on the liquidation of an entry after the delivery of the goods upon payment of estimated duties. The facts are these: In October, 1879, Naylor & Co. imported into the port of Boston, from England, 170 tons of wrought scrap iron, consisting 'of the punchings and clippings of wrought-iron boiler-plates and wrought sheet-iron, left after the process of the manufacture of the boiler-plates into boilers was completed, and of the ends of bridge rods and beams of wrought iron, cut off to bring the rods and beams to the required length, and to remove imperfections.' When the entry was made at the custom-house, the duties were estimated upon the whole, at the rate of eight dollars per ton. On the payment of this estimate the iron was delivered to the importers. Afterwards 263,332 pounds were classified by the customs officers as 'new wrought scrap iron,' and an additional duty of $1,611.92 charged thereon. For the recovery of this amount the suit in favor of the United States was brought. In November, 1879, the same parties imported from England 200 tons of wrought scrap iron, consisting entirely of punchings and clippings, such as are described above. Upon this entry 280,995 pounds were classified as 'old wrought scrap iron,' and charged with duty at the rate of eight dollars per ton, and 138,400 pounds as 'new wrought scrap iron,' and charged at the rate of one cent a pound. The importers paid the duties assessed under protest as to the last item, and then sued to recover back $889.70, the difference between the duties at eight dollars per ton and the amount actually paid. It was agreed that the punchings, clippings, and ends were all waste iron, and incapable of being further used, and that they were only fit for remanufacture. The only actual use to which they had been subjected was in the making of boilers from the plates out of which they had been cut in the process of manufacture, and in the building of bridges of which the rods and beams that had been cut to adapt them to their places formed a part. The importers claimed that all were dutiable as 'wrought scrap iron,' under Schedule E of section 2504 of the Revised Statutes, p. 466, while the collector claimed that the part classified as 'new wrought scrap iron' was subject to a duty of one cent a pound, as 'iron less finished than iron in bars, and more advanced than pig-iron,' because it had not been in 'actual use.'

The court below gave judgmen in each of the suits against the importers, to reverse which these writs of error were brought.

The provisions of the tariff act on which the cases depend are the following clauses in Schedule E of section 2504 of the Revised Statutes: '(1) [Page 464.] But all iron in slabs, blooms, loops, or other forms, less finished than iron in bars, and more advanced than pig-iron, except castings, shall be rated as iron in bars, and pay a duty accordingly,' i. e., one cent per pound. '(2) [Page 466.] Cast scrap iron of every description, six dollars per ton. Wrought scrap iron of every description, eight dollars per ton. But nothing shall be deemed scrap iron except waste or refuse iron that has been in actual use, and is fit only to be remanufactured.'...