Joseph Story

“ The same doctrine was affirmed and acted upon by this court, in the case of the the United States v. Wood, 14 Pet. 430, in the case of a prosecution for perjury.
Cases of fraud present a still more stringent necessity for the application of the same principle; for fraud, being essentially a matter of motive and intention, is often deducible only from a great variety of circumstances, no one of which is absolutely decisive; but all combined together may become almost irresistible as to the true nature and character of the transaction in controversy. ”

“ The whole argument turns upon this, that if the custom-house officers have not pursued the steps authorized by law to be pursued by them, by directing an appraisement of the goods, in cases where they have a suspicion of illegality or fraud, or no invoices are produced, but their suspicions are lulled to rest, the goods are untainted by the forfeiture, the moment they pass from the custom-house. ”

“ The proceeding is in rem, for the enforcement of a forfeiture, and if one cause of forfeiture is effectual, many cannot be more effectual for the purpose. A condemnation upon one cause of forfeiture is an adjudication that the property is in the United States, and is the consummation and merger of the entire prosecution. Under cumulative forfeitures, however numerous, more cannot be done, than under a single forfeiture, to ascertain that the claimant's original property is divested and is become the property of the United States. ”

“ The more natural, if not the necessary, inference in all such cases is that the legislature intend the new laws to be auxiliary to, and in aid of the purposes of, the old law, even when some of the cases provided for may equally be within the reach of each. There, certainly, under such circumstances, ought to be a manifest and total repugnancy in the provisions, to lead to the conclusion that the latter laws abrogated, and were designed to abrogate the former. ”

“ This instruction was certainly correct, if the 66th section of the revenue collection act of 1799, ch. 128, now remains in full force and unrepealed; for it can never be permitted, that a party, who perpetrates a fraud upon the custom-house, and thereby enters his goods upon false invoices and false valuations, and gets a regular delivery thereof upon the mere payment of such duties as such false invoices and false valuations require, can avail himself of that very fraud, to defeat the purposes of justice. ”

“ The remarks just made constitute an answer to the argument upon the demurrers to the two first pleas of the claimant; for, as has been already suggested, if a seizure has been actually made, and is a continuing seizure, it is no bar to proceedings thereon, that the cause of forfeiture relied on is not the same upon which the seizure was originally made. It is sufficient for the United States, that it adopts the seizure and now proceeds for a good cause of forfeiture, although utterly unknown to the original seizors. ”

“ It must, in effect, assert, that the repeal ought to be implied, in all cases where the goods have passed from the custom-house, without detection of the fraud, simply because, if they had been examined, and the fraud detected there, they might, in that case, and in that case only, have been subjected to forfeiture, which would at most only establish a repeal pro tanto. In our opinion, there is no just foundation for the argument, under any aspect. The provision in the 66th section is intended to suppress frauds upon the revenue ”

“ It is impossible to lay down any universal rule upon such a subject. Much must depend upon the posture and circumstances of the particular case; and at all events, if the proof be pertinent and competent, the admission of it cannot be matter of error. ”

“ The other objection has as little foundation; for fraud in the first importation may be as fairly deducible from other subsequent fraudulent importations by the same party, as fraud would be, in the last importation, from prior fraudulent importations. In each case, the quo animo is in question, and the presumption of fraudulent intention may equally arise and equally prevail. ”

“ But under the 66th section no such allegations would be necessary or proper, as the forfeiture immediately attaches to every entry of goods falsely and fraudulently invoiced, without any reference whatever to the mode, or the circumstances under or by which, it is ascertained. ”