Opinion of the Court.

Obviously, this opinion, taken as a whole, makes against rather than in favor of the contention of counsel for the Government. Its argument is to the effect that the stamp required. was in no proper sense a tax for revenue; that there was no burden of any kind on the export; that it was something to facilitate rather than to hinder exports; that it was only a means of identification and to enable parties to remove their tobacco from the manufactory to the warehouse, and that the sum demanded was simply a matter of compensation for services rendered. The statute itself declared that the twenty-five cents was to be paid "for the expense attending the providing and affixing" of the stamps. This clearly excludes the idea that any tax or duty was intended to be imposed, and the opinion notes the fact that the difficulty arises because ordinarily stamps are used for the purpose of duty or tax, says that we must always regard things rather than names, and that this stamp was not used for the purpose of tax or duty but only for identification and to prevent frauds on the Government. If it had been supposed that a stamp tax could properly be charged, the line of argument would have been entirely different. In the case before us the stamp is distinctly for the purpose of revenue and not by way of compensation for services rendered, so that the question is whether revenue can be collected from exports by changing the form of the tax from a tax on the article exported to a tax on the bill of lading which evidences the export.

Again, it is said that if this stamp duty on foreign bills of lading cannot be sustained it will follow that tonnage taxes and stamp duties on manifests must also fall. The validity of such taxes is not before us for determination, and, therefore, we must decline to express any opinion thereon, and yet it may be not improper to say that even if the suggested result should follow it furnishes no reason for not recognizing that which in our judgment is the true construction of the constitutional limitation. Mingling in one statute two or three unconstitutional taxes cannot be held operative to validate either one, and if the reasoning we have stated and followed in reaching the conclusion in this case shall also lead to the result that such taxes are VOL. CLXXXI-20

Opinion of the Court.

invalid, it of itself does not weaken the force of the reasoning or justify us in departing from its conclusions. But we may be permitted to suggest, without deciding, that there may be a valid difference as indicated by the decisions of this court in respect to interstate commerce. It has been distinctly held that no State could by a license or otherwise impose a burden on the business of interstate commerce. Pickard v. Pickard v. Pullman Southern Car Co., 117 U. S. 34, and cases cited in the opinion. And yet that decision was followed by decisions that it might tax the vehicles and property employed in interstate commerce so long and so far as they were a part of the property of the State. Pullman's Palace Car Co. v. Pennsylvania, 141 U. S. 18, and cases cited in the opinion. This difference may have significance in respect to these other taxes. As heretofore said, we do not decide the question, but only make these suggestions to indicate that the matter has been considered.

Another matter pressed upon our attention, which deserves and has received careful consideration, is the practical construction of this constitutional provision by legislative action. On July 6, 1797, an act was passed entitled "An act laying duties on stamped vellum, parchment and paper," (1 Stat. 527,) which contained this clause:

"Any note or bill of lading, for any goods or merchandise to be exported, if from one district to another district of the United States, not being in the same State, ten cents; if to be exported to any foreign port or place, twenty-five cents," etc. p. 528.

This was changed by the act of February 28, 1799, 1 Stat. 622, but only as to the amount. On April 6, 1802, 2 Stat. 148, a repealing act was passed. Again, on July 1, 1862, 12 Stat. 432, a similar stamp duty was imposed on foreign bills of lading, which was continued by the act of June 30, 1864, 13 Stat. 223, 291, finally repealed by the act of June 6, 1872, 17 Stat. 230, 256; and then followed the act in question. In Knowlton v. Moore, supra, in which the inheritance tax was considered, the significance of this practical construction by legislative action was referred to, and on pages 56, 57, we said:

"The act of 1797, which ordained legacy taxes, was adopted

Opinion of the Court.

at a time when the founders of our Government and framers of our Constitution were actively participating in public affairs, thus giving a practical construction to the Constitution which they had helped to establish. Even the then members of the Congress who had not been delegates to the convention which framed the Constitution must have had a keen appreciation of the influences which had shaped the Constitution and the restrictions which it embodied, since all questions which related to the Constitution and its adoption must have been, at that early date, vividly impressed on their minds. It would, under these conditions, be indeed surprising if a tax should have been levied without question upon objects deemed to be beyond the grasp of Congress because exclusively within state authority. It is, moreover, worthy of remark that similar taxes have at other periods and for a considerable time been enforced; and although their constitutionality was assailed on other grounds held unsound by this court, the question of the want of authority of Congress to levy a tax on inheritances and legacies was never urged against the acts in question."

And again, when the construction of the uniformity clause was being considered (p. 92):

"But one of the most satisfactory answers to the argument that the uniformity required by the Constitution is the same as the equal and uniform clause which has since been embodied in so many of the state constitutions, results from a review of the practice under the Constitution from the beginning. From the very first Congress down to the present date, in laying duties, imposts and excises, the rule of inherent uniformity, or, in other words, intrinsically equal and uniform taxes, has been disre garded, and the principle of geographical uniformity consistently enforced."

That was not the first case in which this matter has been considered by this court. On the contrary, it has been often presented. See in the margin a partial list of cases in which the subject has been discussed. An examination of the opinions

1 Stuart v. Laird, 1 Cranch, 299; Martin v. Ilunter's Lessee, 1 Wheat. 304, 351; Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264, 418; Edwards's Lessee v. Darby,

Opinion of the Court.

in those cases will disclose that they may be grouped in three classes: First, those in which the court, after seeking to demonstrate the validity or the true construction of a statute, has added that if there were doubt in reference thereto the practical construction placed by Congress, or the department charged with the execution of the statute, was sufficient to remove the doubt; second, those in which the court has either stated or assumed that the question was doubtful, and has rested its determination upon the fact of a long continued construction by the officials charged with the execution of the statute; and, third, those in which the court, noticing the fact of a long continued construction, has distinctly affirmed that such construction cannot control when there is no doubt as to the true meaning of the statute.

The first class is illustrated by Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264. There the question presented was the jurisdiction of this court over proceedings by indictment in a state court for a violation of a state statute. In an elaborate argument Chief Justice Marshall sustained the jurisdiction, and then added (p. 418): “Great weight has always been attached, and very rightly attached, to contemporaneous exposition. No question, it is 12 Wheat. 206, 210; United States v. State Bank of North Carolina, 6 Pet. 29, 39; United States v. Macdaniel, 7 Pet. 1; Prigg v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 16 Pet. 539; Union Insurance Company v. Hoge, 21 How. 35, 66; United States v. Alexander, 12 Wall. 177, 181; Peabody v. Stark, 16 Wall. 240, 243; Dollar Savings Bank v. United States, 19 Wall. 227, 237; Smythe v. Fiske, 23 Wall. 374, 382; United States v. Moore, 95 U. S. 760, 763; Swift Company v. United States, 105 U. S. 691, 695; Hahn v. United States, 107 U. S. 402, 406; United States v. Graham, 110 U. S. 219, 221; Lithographic Company v. Sarony, 111 U. S. 53, 57; Brown v. United States, 113 U. S. 568, 571; Cooper Manufacturing Company v. Ferguson, 113 U. S. 727, 733; The Laura, 114 U. S. 411, 416; United States v. Philbrick, 120 U. S. 52, 59; United States v. Hill, 120 U. S. 169, 182; United States v. Johnston, 124 U. S. 236, 253; Robertson v. Downing, 127 U. S. 607, 613; Merritt v. Cameron, 137 U. S. 542, 552; Schell's Executors v. Fauché, 138 U. S. 562, 570; United States v. Alabama R. R. Co., 142 U. S. 615, 621; McPherson v. Blacker, 146 U. S. 1; United States v. Tanner, 147 U. S. 661, 663; United States v. Union Pacific Ry. Co., 148 U. S. 562, 572; United States v. Alger, 152 U. S. 384, 397; Webster v. Luther, 163 U. S. 331, 342; Wisconsin Central R. R. Co. v. United States, 164 U. S. 190, 205; Hewitt v. Schultz, 180 U. S. 139-156.

Opinion of the Court.

believed, has arisen to which this principle applies more unequivocally than to that now under consideration."

And in support of that referred to the writings in The Federalist, which were presented before the adoption of the Constitution, and were generally recognized as powerful arguments in its favor; also to the Judiciary Act of 1789, 1 Stat. 73, the decisions of this court and the assent of the courts of several States thereto, saying (p. 421):

"This concurrence of statesmen, of legislators, and of judges in the same construction of the Constitution may justly inspire some confidence in that construction."

Again, in United States v. State Bank of North Carolina, 6 Pet. 29, 39, Mr. Justice Story, in like manner, said:

"It is not unimportant to state, that the construction which we have given to the terms of the act, is that which is understood to have been practically acted upon by the Government, as well as by individuals, ever since its enactment. Many estates, as well of deceased persons, as of persons insolvent who have made general assignments, have been settled upon the footing of its correctness. A practice so long and so general would, of itself, furnish strong grounds for a liberal construction, and could not now be disturbed without introducing a train of serious mischiefs. We think the practice was founded in the true exposition of the terms and intent of the act, but if it were susceptible of some doubt, so long an acquiescence in it would justify us in yielding to it as a safe and reasonable exposition.”

In the second class may be placed Stuart v. Laird, 1 Cranch, 299; Burrow Lithographic Company v. Sarony, 111 U. S. 53, in which last case Mr. Justice Miller, speaking for the court, used this language (p. 57):

"The construction placed upon the Constitution by the first act of 1790, and the act of 1802, by the men who were contemporary with its formation, many of whom were members of the convention which framed it, is of itself entitled to very great weight, and when it is remembered that the rights thus established have not been disputed during a period of nearly a century, it is almost conclusive."

See also The Laura, 114 U. S. 411; United States v. Phil