United States v. New York Cuba Mail Steamshif Company

• Decision Date: 19 February 1906
• Docket Number: No. 116,116
• Citation: 50 L.Ed. 569,200 U.S. 488,26 S.Ct. 327
• Parties: UNITED STATES, Plff. in. Err. , v. NEW YORK & CUBA MAIL STEAMSHIF COMPANY
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

200 U.S. 488

26 S.Ct. 327

50 L.Ed. 569

UNITED STATES, Plff. in. Err.,

v NEW YORK & CUBA MAIL STEAMSHIF COMPANY.

No. 116.

Argued Jenuery 22, 23, 1906.

Decided February 19, 1906.

Assistant Attorney General Robb for plaintiff in error.

Messrs. John G. Carlisle and William Edmond Curtis for defendant in error.

[Argument of Counsels from page 489-490 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice McKenna delivered the opinion of the court:

The defendant in error filed a petition in the district court to recover the amount paid by it for documentary stamps used on manifests of cargoes on certain vessels bound to foreign ports, as required by an act of Congress approved June 13, 1898 [30 Stat. at L. 448, chap. 448, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 2286], entitled 'An Act to Provide Ways and Means to Meet War Expenditures, and for Other Purposes.'

The United States demurred to the petition on the ground that it did not state facts sufficient to constitute a claim against it. The demurrer was overruled and judgment entered for the sum of $240, the amount of claim. 125 Fed. 320.

It appears from the opinion of the district court that the constitutionality of the tax was alone submitted for decision, and the court, upon the authority of Fairbank v. United States, 181 U. S. 283, 45 L. ed. 862, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 648, held that the tax was unconstitutional.

In the Fairbank Case it was held that a stamp tax on bills of lading imposed by the act of June 13 was a tax on exports, and therefore void. In the case at bar the district court observed 'that the essential character of the stamp tax on manifests was that of a tax on exports, in the same sense in which a stamp tax on a bill of lading was a tax on exports.' The United States now concedes the correctness of this ruling, but urges, nevertheless, that the judgment for defendant in error was erroneous because, as is contended, the stamps were purchased and affixed voluntarily and without protest. For this, Chesebrough v. United States, 192 U. S. 253, 48 L. ed. 432, 24 Sup. Ct. Rep. 262, is adduced as controlling. In that case recovery was sought for the price of stamps affixed to a deed in compliance with Schedule A of the act of June 13, 1898. The unconstitutionality of the act was asserted by Chesebrough, but was not discussed by the court. The decision was based on the ground that the payment of the taxes was voluntary. Chesebrough contended that § 7 of the act, which made it a misdemeanor to omit to fix stamps to the instruments enumerated, constituted such coercion as made the payment involuntary; and, besides, that his vendee was unwilling to accept the deed without the stamps required by the act, and that he 'under compulsion of said law,' in order to receive the consideration for his conveyance, to enable his deed to be recorded and received in evidence, and to give a title free from doubt, purchased stamps from the United States collector of internal revenue, and placed them upon the deed.

What is the duress alleged in the case at bar? The averment of the petition is——

'That said act being in force, under compulsion and through fear of criminal prosecution, and in order to obtain clearance papers, which could not have been procured without the delivery to the collector of the port of New York, of outward foreign manifests of cargo, stamped as aforesaid, and without which clearance papers the vessels hereinafter named would have been prevented from sailing, or would have become liable for the penalty imposed by § 4197 of the Revised Statutes of the United States (U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 2840), said James E. Ward & Company, for and on behalf of your petitioner and as such general agents, as aforesaid, purchased and affixed to the said outward foreign manifests of cargo and canceled internal revenue documentary stamps of the United States of the face value of two hundred and forty dollars ($240), as appears more fully by the exhibit hereto annexed and made a part of this petition, and marked 'Exhibit A,' which contains the name of the vessel, the date of delivery to said collector of the outward foreign manifests of cargo, the alleged tax on which is sought to be recovered, and the face value of the documentary internal revenue stamp affixed thereto.'

It is alleged that the stamps were purchased from Walter H. Stiner, a dealer in internal revenue stamps on various days subsequent to January 1, 1900, and that Stiner purchased them from the collector of internal revenue, and the proceeds thereof were duly paid over to the United States.

In this case, as in the Chesebrough Case, the collector was not informed at the time of the purchase of the particular purpose for which the stamps were to be used, and no intimation was given him, written or oral, that defendant in error claimed that the law regarding such stamps was unconstitutional, and that it was making the purchase under duress. And, expressing the principle to be applied, the court said, in the Chesebrough Case, 'even a protest or notice will not avail if the payment be made voluntarily, with full knowledge of all the circumstances, and without any coercion by the actual or threatened exercise of power possessed, or supposed to be possessed, by the party exacting or receiving the payment, over the person or property of the party making the payment, from which the latter has no other means of immediate relief than such payment.'

Applying that principle to the allegation that Chesebrough's vendee was unwilling to accept an...