specifically enumerated in the tariff act of 1913 than in Title V of the war revenue act of 1916 and not mentioned in the repealing clause of the latter, still come within the tariff act of 1913. (See pars. 2, 8, 18, 30, 41, 67, and 387.) PARAGRAPH 2. ACT OF 1913. ACT OF 1909. Acetic anhydrid, 21 2. Acetic anhydrid, 2 cents per pound. 1. * cents per pound; GENERAL INFORMATION. Description and uses.-Acetic anhydride, a colorless liquid with a strong acetic odor, is derived from acetic acid by the removal of water. It is used in the manufacture of acetyl salicylic acid (aspirin) and cellulose acetate, which largely replaces nitrocellulose where a noninflammable substance is especially desirable, as in movingpicture films and as a dope" or varnish for protecting aeroplane wings. 66 Production. It is made by treating anhydrous sodium acetate with phosphorous chloride or sulphur chloride. Prior to the war little, if any, was made in this country. The war demand for aeroplane dopes and the expiration of the patents on "aspirin" caused a great stimulus to the industry. Acetic anhydride is now produced at Midland, Mich., Charleston, W. Va., Carteret, N. J., and St. Louis, Mo.; at St. Louis as a raw material for pharmaceutical chemicals; and at other places as one of several products requiring chlorine. Imports prior to the war were from Germany, and amounted to about 1,200,000 pounds in 1910 and 1911. Imports declined to about 300,000 pounds in 1913, and since have become negligible. INTERPRETATION AND COMMENTS. Phthalic acid anhydride and phosphoric acid anhydride, held exempt from duty, as set forth in "Interpretation and comments" under paragraph 1, are important anhydrides. Phthalic acid anhydride is a coal-tar product and is provided for by name in pending legislation. If it is desired to made phosphoric acid anhydride dutiable it might be enumerated in paragraph 2 with the related article acetic anhydride; if it is to be free, it should be inserted after "phosphoric acid" in paragraph 387. PARAGRAPH 3. 3. Acetone, 1 cent per pound. GENERAL INFORMATION. Description and uses.-Acetone (dimethyl ketone) is a clear, colorless, and highly inflammable liquid. It is used primarily as a solvent for fats, resins, rubber, and other gums, nitrocellulose (cordite, guncotton, pyroxylin plastics), tannins, and acetylene, and in the manufacture of chloroform, but for the last-named purpose has a strong competitor in carbon tetrachloride. Acetone oil (ethyl methyl ketone) is a residue obtained in the purification of acetone produced from acetate of lime. It possesses the same solvent properties as acetone and on-account of its higher boiling point is preferred in some cases. Methyl acetone is the first portion of the distillate in refining crude wood alcohol. It is a mixture of acetone, with some wood alcohol, and methyl acetate. Production of acetone by eight firms in 1914 was 10,425,817 pounds, valued at $1,099,585. Prior to the war acetone was made exclusively from acetate of lime, a product of the hardwood distillation industry. The large war demand for the manufacture of the British explosive, cordite, caused the development of several new processes. The first is the fermentation of various substances--corn, molasses, and kelp. Plants employing these fermentation processes have closed since the signing of the armistice, which indicates inability to compete with acetone produced from acetate of lime. Another process, developed solely by the Canadian Electro Products Co. at Shawinigan Falls, Canada, produces acetone from calcium carbide. This firm, through a subsidiary company, built a plant on behalf of and with funds supplied by the United States Government. There are indications that this process may be able to offer serious competition to the hardwood distillation industry in the manufacture of both acetic acid and acetone. In addition, another process was being developed during the war which produced acetone as a by-product of the Burton method of cracking petroleum oils. This process is still in an experimental stage, but has promising commercial features. Imports have been sporadic and negligible when compared with domestic production. In 1918 there were 148,082 pounds. In 1914 the imports of acetone oil were 155,210 pounds, valued at $14,609, chiefly from Canada. INTERPRETATION AND COMMENTS. Acetone oil, while known in commerce under that name, was declared neither commercially nor industrially an oil but a species of acetone, and accordingly dutiable under the eo nomine provision for acetone in paragraph 3, as claimed by the importer, rather than as a distilled oil under paragraph 46, as classified by the Government. (8 Ct. Cust. Appls., 329, of 1918.) (See par. 498.) Specific provision might be made for acetone oil and for methyl acetone, which is chiefly acetone. For a description of conditions of production and foreign competition, see paragraphs 203 and 204, “frozen and dried eggs, yolk and albumen." Information indicates that bakers and confectioners use the bulk of the imported dried egg albumen, which suggests inclusion in paragraph 204 with other dried egg products. (See par. 203.) - Description and uses.- -Alkalies are a class of chemical compounds which have the property of combining with acids to form salts. All of the alkalies which are of any considerable industrial and commercial importance are mentioned by name elsewhere in the act of 1913. A few of the alkalies have medicinal uses, but these are of minor importance when compared with their industrial chemical uses. Alkaloids are a class of chemical compounds having strong and varied physiological effects and therefore are of great importance in medicine. Many of them occur in plants and are made therefrom, but many new ones not found in nature are made by chemical processes. The following alkaloids are mentioned specifically elsewhere in the tariff act of 1913 and are therefore not dutiable under this paragraph-quinine and all alkaloids derived from cinchona bark, cocaine, morphine, ecgonine, strychnine, and caffeine. Imports reached a maximum of $3,239,102 in 1913 and yielded a revenue of $809,775. During the war the imports decreased to a minimum of $501,627 in 1916 and increased to $1,127,846 in 1918, yielding a revenue of $169,177. This large decrease during the war may be accounted for by the shutting off of imports from Germany. That country was especially successful in producing the rarer chemicals. INTERPRETATION AND COMMENTS. Medicinal preparation defined.—The term "medicinal preparation has been declared to be descriptive, with the same meaning in commerce as in common speech, and to refer to substances used in medicine, prepared for use of apothecary or physician, to be administered as a remedy in disease. (79 Fed., 313, of 1897.) In a later case the term was defined to mean such articles as are of use or believed fairly and honestly to be of use in curing or alleviating or palliating or preventing some disease or affection of the human body. (130 Fed., 624, of 1891.) The definition in the former case was quoted with apparent approval by the Court of Customs Appeals in a decision that volcanic earth, dried and ground in a mill, and used for external application to the body, is not a medicinal preparation. (4 Ct. Cust. Appls., 15, of 1913.) In a case holding malt soup stock and food maltose to be similar to medicinal compounds within paragraph 17 of the act of 1913, the Court of Customs Appeals, quoting the definition in the latter case, declared that the fact that preparations designed to cure or to alleviate or to palliate or to prevent some disease of the human body also afforded nourishment to the patient does not necessarily exclude them from the classification of medicinal compounds or articles simi The provision for lar thereto. (7 Ct. Cust. Appls., 118, of 1916.) medicinal preparations has been held to be more specific than that for chemical compounds and salts. (170 U. S., 584, of 1898.) Chemical compounds and mixtures distinguished.—In a chemical compound the identity of the chemicals as distinct entities is lost in the union, and a new substance having properties radically dif ferent from those of its constituent elements is evolved, while a chemical mixture is simply an intermixture of chemicals with preservation of their corporeal integrity. (2 Ct. Cust. Appls., 285, of 1911, holding a combination of lime and manganese oxide, used in drying and hardening a varnish, to be a chemical mixture; 4 Ct. Cust. Appls., 433, of 1913, holding plate-polishing powder not to be in chief value of a chemical and dutiable as whiting, by similitude, under the act of 1909.) The mixture must be substantially entirely of chemicals. (4 Ct. Cust. Appls., 433, of 1913.) Both compounds and mixtures are artificial products; hence barium binoxide, a combination of barium and oxygen, in which the identity of each chemical element as a separate entity is entirely lost, is a chemical compound. (1 Ct. Cust. Appls., 213, of 1911.) But a natural ore mechanically ground is neither a chemical compound nor a chemical mixture. (5 Ct. Cust. Appls., 196, of 1914.) * * The words "in part of" in section 500, Title V, of the revenue act of September 8, 1916, providing in part for "medicinals * not otherwise specially provided for * when obtained, derived, or manufactured in whole or in part from any of the products provided for in Groups I and II," were interpreted to apply to components, even though not of chief value, and homatropine hydrobromide and similar medicinal preparations composed in part, but not in chief value, of coal-tar products were held to come within that provision as more specific than paragraphs 5 or 17 of the tariff act of 1913. (T. D. 37661, of 1918. See also G. A. 8170, T. D. 37652, of 1918.) Alkalies and alkaloids are covered by the general provision for chemical and medicinal compounds in the same paragraph. With the rate of duty the same, there is no necessity for the separate provision for alkalies and alkaloids. (See pars. 16 and 17.) Coumarin, reported to be suitable for use in the manufacture of perfumery, was found to be used chiefly for making flavoring extracts and dutiable under this paragraph rather than paragraph 49. (Abstract 41691, of 1918.) (See revenue act of 1916.) Mixed acids.-A mixture of 20.16 per cent of sulphuric acid with 72.28 per cent nitric acid, the remainder being water, has been held by the Board of General Appraisers dutiable under this paragraph and not exempt from duty as nitric acid under paragraph 387. (G. A. 8235, T. D. 37927, of 1919.) An appeal to the Court of Customs Appeals is pending. Ginseng root treated with sugar is dutiable as a medicinal preparation under paragraph 5 or 17 according to the size of the package. (T. D. 37885, of 1919.) Antimony sulphide is not a salt or compound of antimony oxide and is therefore dutiable under this paragraph rather than under paragraph 144. (7 Ct. Cust. Appls., 3, of 1916.) Antimony oxide is also dutiable under this paragraph. (Abstract 41027, of 1917.) Eucalyptol, classified as an essential oil under paragraph 46, was declared not to be an essential oil but dutiable as a chemical compound under this paragraph. (Abstract 38963, of 1915.) So-called sliced deer horn, used by the Chinese as a medicine, was held to be dutiable under this paragraph unless put up in individual packages of 24 pounds or less gross weight, when it falls within paragraph 17. (T. D. 36401, of 1916.) Oil hardened by heating in contact with hydrogen and in the presence of nickel, the latter acting as a catalytic agent, the fatty acids taking up a molecule of hydrogen and becoming saturated, was held exempt from duty under paragraph 498, and not dutiable under paragraph 5. (G. A. 8260, T. D. 38031, of 1919.) An appeal to the Court of Customs Appeals is pending. (T. D. 38060, of 1919.) ACT OF 1909. PARAGRAPH 6. 4. Alumina, hydrate of, or refined bauxite, containing not more than 64 per cent of alumina, of 1 cent per pound; containing more than 64 per cent of alumina, of 1 cent per pound. Alum, alum cake, patent alum, sulphate of alumina, and aluminous cake, containing not more than 15 per centum of alumina and more than of 1 per centum of iron oxide, of 1 cent per pound; alum, alum cake, patent alum, sulphate of alumina, and aluminous cake, containing more than 15 per centum of alumina, or not more than of 1 per centum of iron oxide, g of 1 cent per pound. ACT OF 1913. 6. Alumina, hydrate of, or refined bauxite; alum, alum cake, patent alum, sulphate of alumina, and aluminous cake, and all other manufactured compounds of alumina, not specially provided for in this section, 15 per centum ad valorem. GENERAL INFORMATION. ALUMINA, HYDRATE OF, OR REFINED BAUXITE, Description and uses.-Hydrate of alumina, or refined bauxite, is the oxide of the metal aluminum chemically combined with water. It is used principally in the preparation of metallic aluminum and other aluminum compounds; also for waterproofing fabrics and to some extent in medicine. It forms a constituent of many color lakes. Production.-The raw material for the manufacture of alumina hydrate is bauxite (free list, par. 411), which occurs in large deposits in the United States, principally in Arkansas, Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee. The most important deposits in foreign countries are located in France. Most of the hydrate of alumina used in this country is of domestic manufacture from domestic bauxite. This substance is made on a large scale as an intermediate product in the manufacture of metallic aluminum, and aluminum compounds from bauxite. Imports during the five years immediately preceding the war varied from about 1,500,000 pounds to 2,000,000 pounds annually, but since 1914 the imports have greatly decreased, amounting to only 202,968 pounds in 1915 and 418 pounds in 1916. No imports are shown for 1917, but 94,280 pounds were imported in 1918. |