It is getting harder and harder to know what is going on in the world. The Left is currently furious that the nationalist Trump just met Putin and did not act like more of a nationalist.
At the time the Port Authority of New York classified tomatoes as vegetables, which were subject to a 10 percent import tax.
When one Manhattan wholesaler — John Nix & Co., owned by John Nix and his four sons — got hit with the tariff on a shipment of Caribbean tomatoes, he disputed the tax on the grounds that tomatoes were not technically vegetables.
The case, filed in 1887, made its way to the Supreme Court in 1893 as Nix v. Hedden. There, the court disagreed with the Nixes, ruling that people neither prepare nor eat tomatoes like fruits — and that they should be taxed accordingly.
In the case, witnesses read from dictionaries, and definitions for "fruit" and "vegetable" were read in court. Also definitions of "tomato," "pea," "eggplant," "cucumber," "squash" and "pepper."
In the Supreme Court decision, the justices distinguished between science and everyday life. The justices admitted that botanically speaking, tomatoes were technically fruits. But in everyday life, they decided, vegetables were things "usually served at dinner in, with, or after the soup, fish, or meats ... and not, like fruits generally, as dessert."
So under customs law, the court ruled, tomatoes counted as vegetables — and the importer had to keep paying the tariff.
Sometime the government just can not say "no."
An ad for John Nix & Co. (Fruit Trade Journal and Produce Record/Google Books)
The silliness of government sometimes requires the willing suspension of disbelief. It is a tempest in search of a teapot.
Let us return to the government that we know and fondly remember, a government that took on hard, dark questions and led us into the clear day. Like, for example, is the tomato a fruit or a vegetable? You will be pleased to know this botanical question was decided by the Supreme Court of the United States, in 1893. it did not go well.
Let us return to the government that we know and fondly remember, a government that took on hard, dark questions and led us into the clear day. Like, for example, is the tomato a fruit or a vegetable? You will be pleased to know this botanical question was decided by the Supreme Court of the United States, in 1893. it did not go well.
When one Manhattan wholesaler — John Nix & Co., owned by John Nix and his four sons — got hit with the tariff on a shipment of Caribbean tomatoes, he disputed the tax on the grounds that tomatoes were not technically vegetables.
The case, filed in 1887, made its way to the Supreme Court in 1893 as Nix v. Hedden. There, the court disagreed with the Nixes, ruling that people neither prepare nor eat tomatoes like fruits — and that they should be taxed accordingly.
In the case, witnesses read from dictionaries, and definitions for "fruit" and "vegetable" were read in court. Also definitions of "tomato," "pea," "eggplant," "cucumber," "squash" and "pepper."
In the Supreme Court decision, the justices distinguished between science and everyday life. The justices admitted that botanically speaking, tomatoes were technically fruits. But in everyday life, they decided, vegetables were things "usually served at dinner in, with, or after the soup, fish, or meats ... and not, like fruits generally, as dessert."
So under customs law, the court ruled, tomatoes counted as vegetables — and the importer had to keep paying the tariff.
Sometime the government just can not say "no."
But there is rebellion in the winds. Tennessee and Ohio have named the tomato their state fruit, without Federal consequences, at least as yet. New Jersey has made it the state vegetable, specifically citing Nix v. Hedden, setting up possible intra-state conflict. The Union trembles on the fault line.
To my knowledge no group violence or harassment has developed from this discrepancy and injustice.
An ad for John Nix & Co. (Fruit Trade Journal and Produce Record/Google Books)
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