Court Opinion

ID: 9444306
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 20:55:50.484467+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:48.320602
License: Public Domain

SOPER, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
It does not seem to me unreasonable to require the U-Drive-It Companies to comply with the terms of the statute. If they choose to rent their cars to any one who comes along, they must accept the attendant risks. Their protection lies in the fact that in the vast majority of cases, such as those described in the opinion of the court, the renter of the car uses it for legitimate purposes. Exceptional cases, not limited to bootleggers, which involve loss, inevitably occur because the car owner entrusts his vehicles to strangers without inquiry in order to increase the revenue of the enterprise; but that is an expense of the business which he must reckon with.
In any event, the language of the statute clearly includes every car owner who gives an interest in the vehicle to another by contract or agreement. Doubtless Congress had primarily in mind automobile dealers, finance companies and prospective lien holders, but it was careful not to confine the statute to such persons and broadened it so as to include “any claimant” with an interest arising out “of any contract” with a person having a bad reputation for violating the liquor laws. As the opinion of the court shows, it has been held in a number of federal circuits that the statute applies to lessors in general. The discretion of the District Judge to remit forfeitures is manifestly limited by the conditions of the statute and should be exercised in accordance therewith. It should be borne in mind that the basic statute is 26 U.S.C.A. § 3321 which provides for the forfeiture of vehicles used in the removal or concealment of illicit liquors; and that it is for Congress rather than the courts to determine the permissible exceptions to the rule.