Parrott & Co. v. United States

This is an appeal from the dismissal in the District Court of appellant’s complaint under the Tucker Act, 28 U.S.C.A. § 41 (20), for a refund of taxes levied upon the appellant in respect to bottled rum imported by the appellant from the Virgin Islands. We do not have the aid of an opinion of the District Court in determining upon what grounds it disposed of the seven issues tendered by the complaint and necessarily decided in its dismissal.

The taxes collected are on the rum as distilled spirits and on the rum as rectified. As later seen, the rectification tax is on the rum and not on the occupation of rectifier.

As to both, the taxes were assessed pursuant to Section 3350 of the Internal Revenue Code enacted in 1918, 26 U.S.C.A. Int.Rev.Code, § 3350, providing

“(a) Taxes imposed in the United States. Except as provided in section 3123, there shall be levied, collected, and paid in the United States, upon articles coming into the United States from the Virgin Islands, a tax equal to the internal revenue tax imposed in the United States upon like articles of domestic manufacture.

“(b) Exemption From Tax Imposed in the Virgin Islands. Such articles shipped from such islands…