l1NITED STATES tJ. L. M., C. '" X. R. 00.
701
during the period in question, and that the profits shown by their books during that period, on which tax is claimed, are fully wiped out by certain items charged to profit and 1081 in 1869. The court disposed of the first defence as follows: An action of debt may be maintained to recover taxes, without an assessment, where the statute describes the subject of. the taxes and fixes the rates so that the amount may be ascertained by evidence. Dollar Savings Bank v. U. S. 19 Wall. 227; King v. U. S. 99 U. S. 229; The U. S. v. S. J. Tilden, 24 Int. Rev. Rec. 99. Nor will the fact that an assessment has been made and paid be a bar to a suit for the recovery of an amount claimed to' due over and above the amount which has been assessed and paid U. S. v. Hazal'd, 22 Int. Rev. Rec. 809; U. S. v. S. J. Tilden, 24 Int. Rev. Bec. 99. The tax imposed by section 122 of the statute, although substantially a tax upon the stockholder, so far as its effects and results are concerned, yet the obligation to pay the tax, is by this section imposed upon the corporation, and this would seem to be the view entertained by the supreme court of the United States in the Michigan Central R. Co. v. Slack, Collector, 26 Int. Rev. Rec. 60. This being an action against the corporation for taxes imposed by statute, and not upon an assessment for taxes, the limitation of 15 months within which an assessment may be made does not apply; and congress not having fixed & time within which an action of this character shall be brought, "no laches can be imputed to the government, and against it no time can run so as to bar its rights." The U. S. v. Thompson, 98 U. S. 486; The U. S. v. Kirkpatrick, 9 Wheat.; The U. S. v. Williams, 5 McLean, 133. It is not necessary now to consider the effect of the lease by the defendant to the Pennsylvania Central & St. Louis Railway and the Pennsylvania Railroad Company further than to say tha.t such lease did not dissolve the corporation. and it may still be sued for liabilities incurred prior to such leuG. But wheth9r the property ca.n be Bubjected to the
709
FEDERAL REPORTER.
satisfaction of a judgment obtained, and the mode of subjection, are questions not now before the court. Upon the Sf cJnd defence the court held that a portion of the items charged to profit and loss in 1869 was properly chargeable to expenses and losses incurred in operating the road during the period named, and should be deducted from the amount of apparent profits shown by their current reports, thus reducing the sum to $168,707.22, upon which the plaintiff was entitled to recover the tax of 5 per cent., amounting to $8,435.36. The remaining items charged to profit and loss in 1869, being the estimated depreciation of assets during the period in question, the court held not to be properly chargeable to expenses, and could not be deducted from profits earned during the period, and used in construction or carried to the credit of any fund. Exceptions were taken by the defendant, and the case will be carried to the supreme court.
FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF CINCINNATI
v.
BATES.
(District Court, 8. D. Ohio.
lIfarch,1880.)
WAREHOUSE RECEIPT-AssIGNMENT-CONVERSION OF PROPERTY-AcTION BY ASSIGNEE.-The assignment of a warehouse receipt transfers the legal title and constructive possession of the property to the assignee, and he may maintain an action for its conversIOn.
Trover, by the assignee of certain warehouse receipts, to recover for the wrongful conversion of the property. The petition in this case states substantially that on or about the twenty-third day of December, A. D. 1876, one James B. Grant, being then indebted to the plaintiff in a large sum of money, and anticipating that he might thereafter desire to borrow other large sums of money from time to time of the plaintiff, upon such collateral securities as the said Grant might from time to time be able to furnish, did then and there agree with the plaintiff that any and all property that was left with the said bank as collateral, of what-
FIRST NATIONA:£. BANK V. BATES.
70&
ever nature the same might be, whether it was personal chattels or bonds, bills, notes, securities, or choses in action of any kind, or any other property, might be held by said bank as a pledge and collateral to any indebtedness that might then and there exist between the said Grant and the said bank; that in pursuance of said agreement, and upon the faith of such securities as the said Grant agreed to furnish, the plaintiff, from time to time, discounted notes and bills for the said Grant, and loaned him money thereon; that on the twentieth of December, 1876, Grant was the owner' of 150 tierces of lard, which he left in store with the defendant, and received from him a warehouse receipt therefor, as follows: December, 1876. "Received in store, from James B. Grant, 150 tierces lard, prime steam lard, weighing this day fifty thousand two hundred and fifty pounds net, (50,250 lbs. net,) which are subject to his order upon the return of this warehouse receipt. [Signed] "R. M. BATES, "Per G. BOGEN, Jr." "(JINClNNATI,
-And that said Grant, on or about the twenty-third day of Decembell, A. D. 1876, pledged and delivered said warehouse receipt as colateral security to the plaintiff. That the defendant kept in store large quantities of lard at his warehouse, and, from time to time, issued his warehouse receipts to those for whom he held the property in store; that from long and general usage in commerce and trade such warehouse receipts have now, and for a long time past have had, a well understood import among business men, and heretofore have been and are now extensively used in the city of Cincinnati as a common security in obtaining loans and discounts, and in other dealings with banks and bankers; and that the said warehouse receipt was issued by the defendant to the said Grant, that the same might be used by the said Grant as collateral security in his various business transactions ; that the said Grant left the said warehouse receipt as with the plaintiff, in pursuance of the agreement made with it on the twentJ·-third day of December, 1876;