There is a presumption against retrospective legislation and words in a statute will not be construed as having such effect unless they clearly can have no other effect, and the legislative intent cannot otherwise be satisfied; and in this respect the use in the statute of the future tense must be given weight. THE question in the case is whether certain sugars which were imported between the twelfth of June and the twentyeighth of September, 1903, were chargeable with full duties under the tariff act of July 24, 1897, or were entitled to twenty per cent reduction of duties prescribed by that act, under the treaty between the United States and Cuba of the date December 11, 1902, and an act of Congress of December 17, 1903. The answer to the question depends upon when the treaty went into effect, whether upon the tenth of April, 1903, or the twenty-seventh of December, 1903. The appellee contends for the former and the appellant for the latter date. Duties were assessed under the act of 1897 without reduction. Protests were filed and an appeal taken to the board of appraisers, who sustained the collector. The decision of the board was reversed by the Circuit Court. The treaty provided, 33 Stat. 2136, 2142, among other things as follows: . "The President of the United States of America, and the President of the Republic of Cuba . have in consideration of, and in compensation for, the respective concessions and engagements made by one to the other as hereinafter recited, agreed and do hereby agree upon the following articles for the regulations and government of their reciprocal trade, namely: Article II. "During the term of this convention, all articles of merchandise not included in the foregoing Article I, and being the product of the soil or industry of the Republic of Cuba imported into the United States shall be admitted at a reduction of twenty per centum of the rates of duty thereon as provided by the tariff act of the United States approved July 24, 1897, or as may be provided by any tariff law of the United States subsequently enacted." Article XI was as follows: "The present convention shall be ratified by the appropriate authorities of the respective countries, and the ratifications shall be exchanged at Washington, District of Columbia, United States of America, as soon as may be before the thirty-first day of January, 1903, and the convention shall go into effect on the tenth day after the exchange of ratifications, and shall continue in force for the term of five (5) years from date of going into effect, and from year to year thereafter until the expiration of one year from the day when either of the contracting parties shall give notice to the other of its intention to terminate the same." By supplemental treaty signed January 26, 1903, 33 Stat. 2145, it was provided that "the respective ratifications of the said convention shall be exchanged as soon as possible, and within two months from January 31, 1903." March 19, 1903, the Senate added the following amendment at the end of Article XI: "This convention shall not take effect until the same shall have been approved by the Congress." On March 31, 1903, ratifications were exchanged. At this date Congress was not in session, but was convened in special session November 9, 1903, and passed on December 17, 1903, 33 Stat. 3, an act entitled: "An act to carry into effect a convention between the United States and the Republic of Cuba, signed on the eleventh day of December in the year 1902." Section 1 provides as follows: "That whenever the President of the United States shall receive satisfactory evidence that the Republic of Cuba has made provision to give full effect to the articles of the convention between the United States and the Republic of Cuba, signed on the eleventh day of December, in the year nineteen hundred and two, he is hereby authorized to issue his proclamation declaring he has received such evidence, and thereupon, on the tenth day after exchange of ratifications of such convention be Statement of the Case. 202 U.S. tween the United States and the Republic of Cuba, and so long as the said convention shall remain in force, all articles of merchandise being the product of the soil or industry of the Republic of Cuba, which are now imported into the United States free of duty, shall continue to be so admitted free of duty, and all other articles of merchandise being the product of the soil or industry of the Republic of Cuba imported into the United States shall be admitted at a reduction of twenty per centum of the rates of duty thereon, as provided by the tariff act of the United States approved July twenty-fourth, eighteen hundred and ninety-seven, or as may be provided by any tariff law of the United States subsequently enacted. The rates of duty herein granted by the United States to the Republic of Cuba are and shall continue during the term of said convention preferential in respect to all like imports from other countries: Provided, That while said convention is in force no sugar imported from the Republic of Cuba, and being the product of the soil or industry of the Republic of Cuba, shall be admitted into the United States at a reduction of duty greater than twenty per centum of the rates of duty thereon, as provided by the tariff act of the United States approved July twentyfourth, eighteen hundred and ninety-seven, and no sugar the product of any other foreign country shall be admitted by treaty or convention into the United States while this convention is in force at a lower rate of duty than that provided by the tariff act of the United States approved July twenty-fourth, eighteen hundred and ninety-seven: And provided further, That nothing herein contained shall be held or construed as an admission on the part of the House of Representatives that custom duties can be changed otherwise than by an act of Congress, originating in said House." The same day (December 17, 1903) the President issued his proclamation, 33 Stat. 2136, which, after setting forth the treaty and the act of Congress and reciting the above facts, together with the fact that ratifications of said convention had been exchanged on March 31, 1903, declared: 202 U. S. Argument for the United States. "And whereas satisfactory evidence has been received by the President of the United States that the Republic of Cuba has made provision to give full effect to the articles of said convention: "Now, therefore, be it known that I, Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States of America, in conformity with the said act of Congress, do hereby declare and proclaim the said convention, as amended by the Senate of the United States, to be in effect on the tenth day from the date of this my proclamation." The Solicitor General for the United States, in this case, and in No. 652, argued simultaneously herewith: 1 The treaty and act were prospective and coterminous. The original stipulation that the treaty was to take effect ten days after exchange of ratifications was superseded by the Senate amendment, ratified and approved by Cuba, that the treaty should not take effect until approved by Congress. The subsequent action of the contracting parties was in accordance with that intent. The act was passed to carry the treaty into effect; its language is prospective. The words "on the tenth day after exchange of ratifications" are said to be retrospective because the President's proclamation after the passage of the act showed for the first time that ratifications had been theretofore exchanged. But the Executive alone knew this; Congress was not advised at the time the act was passed that ratifications had been exchanged March 31, 1903. At that date Congress was not in session, having adjourned March 4, 1903. A special session of the Senate began March 5 and adjourned March 19, the day the resolution amending the treaty was adopted. The President's proclamation of October 10, 1903, convening a special session to consider the treaty, sets forth that the approval of Congress is necessary before the treaty shall take effect; and in his message to that session he refers to ratification without stating when the treaty was 1 Franklin Sugar Refining Company v. United States, post, p. 580. Argument for the United States. 202 U. S. Both ratified or whether ratifications had been exchanged. Houses thought that the stipulation as to the exchange of ratifications was superseded by the Senate amendment, and supposed that final step had been deferred until Congress should act. That Congress did not intend a retroactive effect is clear from the committee reports and debates. The discussion in Senate and House was as to the scope of the treaty-making power and the propriety of granting the proposed reductions in the Cuban tariff. The fact was mentioned that the bill would make an annual reduction of $8,000,000 in duties on imports from Cuba, which would have meant, in case of retrospective operation, a refund of $6,000,000 for the previous nine months. Yet nothing was said about this, and no provision whatever was made. The treaty and act took effect simultaneously on the tenth day after proclamation. The approval by Congress was conditional: the President was first to ascertain whether Cuba had made provision to give full effect to the convention, issue his proclamation declaring that he had received such evidence, and "thereupon on the tenth day after exchange of ratifications" the new arrangement was to begin. This was clearly within the authority of Congress to do. Field v. Clark, 143 U. S. 649. The President, although aware of the fact that ratifications had been exchanged, had to construe the law so as to carry into effect the intention of Congress, which was clearly that not only should the new arrangement not begin to operate until Cuba had made due provision on her part, but that ten days' notice should be given before it should take effect, as originally provided in the treaty. The President therefore did the only possible and logical thing under the circumstances. Even if the approval of Congress and the action of the President were not strictly in accordance with the terms of the treaty, no one but Cuba could take exception. The interpretation and enforcement of such treaty stipulations are |