Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 10.djvu/665

UNITED STATES V. DE VISSEE. 653 �payment of the duties was intended to be eut off immediately after the lapse of three years, and until 1866 any surplus value v?as for- feited to the government. �The tendency and effect of this atatute, enforced according to this construction, which involvea some loss to the owner at best, throujgh a sale of his goods under unfavorable circumstances, bas undoubt- edly been to secure payment of duties within three years on the vast majority of warehouse entries. It is of more consequence to the government to secure this general resuit, than to obtain a somewhat earlier payment of duties on the f ew goods which, under this policy, are still left over after three years, which might be obtained by con- senting to their withdrawal on payment of duties before actual sale ; and sucb a right of withdrawal on payment after three years, was, therefore, intended to be prohibited by this act. �2. The Btatute of 1861, prier to the amendment of 1866, was thus to some extent punitive, Though the forfeiture of any excess upon a sale is now remitted, the general purpose of the act cannot be deemed thereby changed, or its effect in cutting off the right of with- drawal after three years, on payment of duties by either principal or surety, repealed. These must remain the same. �The necessary logical and practical resuit of the enforcement of these provisions must be that the government's right of action upon the bond is suspended until the sale of the goods. If such a suit could be brought before sale the importer or surety, on being sued, might pay at once; and, in that case, the goods would not be sold, and the "proceeds applied to the payment of the duties, charges, and expenses," as provided by the act of 1866. This is, perhaps, rather a verbal than a substantial criticism. But it is certainly contrary to the intent of this act that the government should sue for and collect the duties, and still keep the goods ; nor, after collecting the whole duty by suit, could it then deliver up the goods to the owner without violating the very purpose, policy, and objeot of the statute in declar- ing that the goods should be "deemed abandoned and sold." If that could be done, the payment on suit would beoome merely a mode of withdrawal of the goods by the owner after three years, which is pro- hibited. Nor, prier to the amendment of 1866, (when there was no provision for returning to the owner any surplus, or eveii any pro- ceeds of the sale, if the duties were collected first,) can it be supposed that it was the intent of the act that the duties might first be col- lected in full by suit on the bond, and that then a double payment, either wholly or in part, might be exacted through a sale of the ��� �