Samuel Nelson

“ If, because a particular skin is called in commerce a sheepskin, it is removed from the genus 'skin,' by the same argument Saxony wool, or Smyrna wool, would not be comprised under 'wool unmanufactured;' nor camwood or fustic, under 'dye woods,' in schedule H; nor horsehair under 'hair of all kinds,' nor beaver fur under 'furs,' nor emeralds under 'precious stones,' in schedule G, &c.
It is obvious that such a rule of construction would destroy the tariff. Does a stone cease to be a precious stone because it is called an emerald? or a skin cease to be a skin because it is called a sheepskin? ”

“ The law applicable to the fact made the importations liable to the rate of duty provided in the third section of the act of 1946.
The opinions of the witnesses introduced by the plaintiffs, that sheepskins, imported with the wool on the skin, dried, as it came from the body of the sheep, may be comprehended under the denomination of raw hides and skins dried, cannot change the law, can have no legal effect to alter the construction of the statutes. It is the province of the witness to testify as to fact; it is the province of the judge to pronounce the law applicable to the fact. ”

“ When the skin or hide is shorn, one part is denominated wool or hair, and the remainder is no longer termed a 'skin,' but a 'pelt.'
VII. Thus as 'hair' pays a duty of ten per cent., but the skin with the hair on, only a duty of five per cent., in the case of a deerskin; so in the case of a sheepskin, while the 'wool' pays a duty of thirty per cent., the skin with the wool on should pay only a duty of five per cent. ”