This is a proceeding in equity under section 6 of title 2 of the National Prohibition Act ( 41 Stat. 310 ) to review a decision of the Commissioner-of Internal Revenue refusing an application for a permit to withdraw intoxicating liquor from a government bonded warehouse for beverage purposes.

Two questions are presented for decision: First, may such a proceeding be instituted against the local prohibition director in the, district where the application is made and refused? And, second, may-intoxicating liquor in a government bonded warehouse be withdrawn therefrom for beverage purposes where the liquor was owned by the applicant at the time the National Prohibition Act took effect and was. held by him for his private use ?

[1] The act is silent on the questions of venue and jurisdiction, but subdivision 7 of section 1 of title 2 provides as follows:

*394 In view of this provision, I am inclined to the opinion that the local prohibition director, who refused the application for a permit, is a proper party defendant, and the only necessary party. Any other construction of the act would compel litigants to resort to the District of Columbia, where the Commissioner of Internal Revenue resides, and I do not think that any such hardship was contemplated by Congress.

[2] A solution of the second question depends upon a construction of the National Prohibition Act and the decision of the Supreme Court in Street v. Lincoln Safe Deposit Co., 254 U. S. 88 , 41 Sup. Ct. 31, 65 L. Ed. 151 , 10 A. L. R. 1548. The question for decision in that case was thus stated by the court:

The question thus stated was answered in the affirmative. That case was decided more than a year ago, and soon thereafter the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, with the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, prescribed a regulation forbidding the withdrawal of intoxicating liquor in bond for beverage purposes. So far as I am advised, the validity of this regulation is now brought in question for the first time, and while the ruling of executive officers is not controlling upon the court, T think its validity has been very generally acquiesced in by the public. The act itself makes a plain distinction between liquor in bond and liquor out of bond held for private purposes. Thus section 3 of title 2 contains the following proviso:

I am convinced, therefore, that Congress never intended that intoxicating liquor should be withdrawn from bonded warehouses for beverage purposes after the effective date of the National Prohibition Act.

The petition is accordingly denied.