Vietor v. Arthur

ERROR to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

Subsequently to June 22, 1874, Vietor imported into New York, stockings. Some of them were wholly worsted. The others were composed of cotton and worsted, cotton being the material of chief value. They were intended to be worn by men, women, and children, and were made on frames. They were also 'knit goods,' this term comprising all goods made on frames, and also all hand-knit stockings and other knitted articles of various kinds.

They were classified by the appraiser as worsted knit goods, costing over eighty cents a pound, and Arthur, the collector of customs of the port of New York, exacted a duty at the rate of ninety per cent of fifty cents per pound and thirty-five per cent ad valorem, holding that the goods were, as knit goods, subject to the duty prescribed by schedule L, class 3 sect. 2504, Rev. Stat. The importer claimed that they were dutiable as stockings made on frames, worn by men, women, and children, and subject to the duty prescribed in schedule M. Both schedules are set out in the opinion of this court.

The duties claimed by the collector were paid under protest, and Vietor brought this suit against him. Judgment having been rendered for the defendant, Vietor sued out this writ.

Mr. Stephen G. Clarke for the plaintiff in error.

Mr. Edwin P. Smith, Assistant Attorney-General, contra.

MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WAITE delivered the opinion of the court.