US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS

1. For tariff purposes, Congress has at all times since the passage of the Act of May 2, 1792, 1 Stat. 259, intended to preserve the distinction between "chocolate" and "confectionery."

2. Chocolate, eo nomine, is, by the first section of the Act of June 6, 1872, 17 Stat. 231, dutiable at the rate of five cents per pound, and although put up in a particular form and sold as "confectionery," is not subjected to the duty imposed on the latter article by the first section of the Act of June 30, 1864, 13 id. 202.

This was an action by A. Stephani & Co., to recover an chanrobles.com-red

Page 96 U. S. 126

alleged excess of duty paid upon certain chocolate imported by them from Liverpool in 1873, and upon which the collector of the port of New York, holding it to be "confectionery," exacted a duty of fifty cents per pound ad valorem, under the first section of the Act of June 30, 1864, 13 Stat. 202. The importers claimed it to be dutiable as "chocolate" under the first section of the Act of June 6, 1872, 17 id. 231, which imposes a duty of five cents per pound.

The case was tried by the court below without the intervention of a jury, and by an agreed statement of facts it was admitted that the chocolate was in boxes containing thirty-six little bricks, done up in separate papers, each box weighing about half a pound, and that the chocolate, being such as is ordinarily sold by confectioners as confectionery, and by the box or package, was valued at over thirty cents per pound. It was also admitted that chocolate comes in other forms.

Judgment having been rendered in favor of the plaintiffs, the collector brought the case here.