332 Opinion of the Court. son, and not be a fruitless, useless inhibition only resulting in what is in effect a duplication of punishment for substantially the same crime, as in the case of United States v. Katz, 271 U. S. 354, 362. It would seem to be admissible and wise, in a law seeking to impose taxes for the sale of an elusive subject, to require conformity to a prescribed method of sale and delivery calculated to disclose or make more difficult any escape from the tax. If this may be done, any departure from the steps enjoined may be punished, and added penalties may be fixed for successive omissions, but all for the one ultimate purpose of making it difficult to sell opium or other narcotics without registering or paying the tax. The reasonableness of such requirements is well illustrated in the many limitations which were imposed upon the ancient freedom in the making and sale of distilled spirits, to the end that the collection of the heavy tax on the subject-matter might be successfully secured in spite of the temptation to avoid the tax. The provision of § 2 making it an offense to sell unless the purchaser gives a particular official form of order to the seller was enacted with a like object. The sale without such an order thus carries its illegality on its face. Its absence dispenses with the necessity of sending to examine the list of those registered to learn whether the seller is engaged in a legal sale. The requirement that the official forms can only be bought and obtained by one entitled to buy, whose name shall be stamped on the order form, and that after the sale the order form shall be recorded, effects a kind of registration of lawful purchasers, in addition to one of lawful sellers, and keeps selling and buying on a plane where evasion of the tax will be difficult. There are persons who may lawfully have access to or even custody of the drugs without registration. Thus included among such persons are the employees of those Opinion of the Court. 276 U.S. who have registered and paid the tax. If they were to attempt to sell such drugs, the necessity for an order form from the would-be purchaser would embarrass the illegal sale, for the participants would hesitate to make a record of the transaction. Thus the operation of § 2, in preventing an individual not a registered dealer or physician from acquiring the drug other than by an order form or a prescription, is directly related to tax enforcement, because such drugs are not necessarily consumed by the purchaser but may be peddled or sold illegally. These order form provisions constitute a needed check on illegal sales, and they are distinctly helpful in the detection of any attempted dealing in, or selling of, the drug free from the tax. Section 2 of the Act is the same as it was when originally passed in 1914. The construction put upon it before the amendment of § 1, by the Revenue Act of 1918; must be the same now as before. Under § 1 in the original Act, the only provision to keep track of purchasers was the order form provision of § 2, as it is now. Without it, unless it applied to those not required to register or pay the tax, there was no restriction upon such persons, whether illegal sellers or illegal purchasers, in the disposition and spread of the drug, except the simple punishment for unregistered sellers in the first section, and there was entire immunity from order requirements of the purchasers from illegal sales. We can not suppose that, considering the general language of § 2, any such result was intended by Congress. By the amendment of § 1, much higher occupation taxes were imposed, and they vary in amount for producers and manufacturers and for wholesale and retail dealers and for physicians. More than that, an excise tax of one cent per ounce of the drug is imposed and payment thereof is to be evidenced by stamps attached to the bottle or box 332 Opinion of the Court. containing the drug, and the sale of the drug from anything but a stamped bottle or container is punishable. The provision for order forms is thus useful under the amended section, and there is therefore still reason for holding the provisions of § 2 to apply to all persons so as to be helpful in promoting detection of evasion from the added tax imposed under the new § 1. The two tax provisions of that section would be much less effective if a purchaser of drugs from an unregistered dealer is not required to furnish an order form. The purchaser may be himself one who should register, but has not done so, or he may be dealing in and selling the drug on which the stamp tax has not been paid, and it is just as important that sales by an unregistered dealer should be punished, unless made on a prescribed form, as that sales by registered dealers should be subject to penalty. 1 There is nothing in the language of the section itself that would reduce the significance of the words "any person" from the meaning of "all persons" to that of those persons only who are required to register and pay the tax, as there was in United States v. Jin Fuey Moy, 241 U. S. 394, upon which the appellant relies much. In that case, the defendant was indicted for conspiring to get morphine into the possession of an unregistered person for use by him as an addict and not for medical purposes. The question was whether the possession conspired for was within § 8 of the Act, declaring it unlawful for any person who was not registered and had not paid the special tax to have the drug in his possession. It was held that § 8 applied only to persons required to register under § 1 and pay the occupation tax. The language of § 8 is more restricted than § 2. It reads: "That it shall be unlawful for any person not registered under the provisions of this Act, and who has not paid the special tax provided for by this Act, to have in his possession or under Opinion of the Court. 276 U.S. his control any of the aforesaid drugs." The words " any person" in § 2 are not linked with those who have not registered and have not paid the tax, but ought to do so, as are the same words in § 8. The narrow construction of § 8 in the Jin Fuey Moy case was reached, in part certainly, because of the juxtaposition of the words. This is shown by a more recent decision of this Court in United States v. Wong Sing, 260 U. S. 18. In that case, Wong Sing was indicted under the amendment, § 1006 of the Revenue Act of 1918, for purchasing the drug not from an original stamped package and not from a person who was a registered dealer. It was objected that, under the Jin Fuey Moy case, a person to be criminally liable under § 1006 must be of a class who must register and pay taxes, but it was held that that section was not limited, as § 8 was held to be. In Fyke v. United States, 254 Fed. 225, the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit decided that the proper construction of § 2, under the original Act of 1914, made it applicable to sales by any person, whether registered or not. Speaking of the Act as it was before 1918, the Court said: "All sellers were members of the class required to register and pay the tax, under § 1, and the revenue derived from sellers, as provided for by that section, could manifestly not be collected unless Congress had the power to, and did in fact, punish the sale of the prohibited drugs by all persons except when made in conformity to the act. The necessity of prohibiting sales by unregistered persons and of sales by registered persons, not complying with the act, were of equal importance. If only the latter class were subject to its penalties, all persons, by failing to register, could sell with impunity, without paying the tax or complying with the other requirements of the act. "Section 1 punishes sales by persons who have neither registered nor paid the tax. Section 2 punishes persons 332 Opinion of the Court. who sell, not in pursuance of a written order of the person to whom the sale is made. The language of § 2 is general, and does not restrict the prohibition to registered sellers in terms. Indeed, the exception, lettered 'd,' applies to a class expressly excepted from registry and payment of the tax by § 1. This exception would seem to be superfluous, if § 2 applied only to registered persons, since the excepted class would not then be included in the class against whom the penalties of the section are directed." The exception "d" here referred to is that which requires no order form to be used by officers of the national, state, county and municipal governments, in purchases for certain governmental uses, and which would indicate that such officers, who are not required to register, would, but for this exception, be covered by § 2. The Circuit Court of Appeals of the Ninth Circuit, in Coleman v. United States, 3 F. (2d) 243, expressly found that the first provision of § 2 was not intended to be limited in its application to the persons required to register under § 1. United States v. Katz, 271 U. S. 354, is said to be in conflict with our view of the question before us. We do not think so. Defendants there were indicted for a conspiracy to sell intoxicating liquors, without making a permanent record of the sale, in violation of § 10, Title II, of the National Prohibition Act. That section provided that no person should make, sell or transport intoxicating liquor without making a permanent record of it, showing in detail the amount and kind of liquor dealt with, the names of persons with whom dealt, and the time and place of such dealing. The form of the records was to be prescribed by the Commissioner and to be open to inspection by him, his agent, or any peace officer of the State. The defendants contended that the section applied only to those who under the Act were authorized to sell liquor under a permit. The United States con |