C-8/74. Dassonville was prosecuted by the Belgian authorities for importing Scotch whisky from the UK without a certificate of origin. In defence, Dassonville argued that by imposing a requirement to obtain such a certificate, the authorities were in breach of Art. 28 of the ECTreaty, which prevented quantitative restrictions on imported goods. Belgium argued that it was not restricting trade by imposing a particular trading requirement on an importer -- it was clear what the importer needed to do to comply with national law, and there was nothing to prevent his compliance.
However, the ECJ held that
``All trading rules ... which are capable of hindering, directly or indirectly, actually or potentially, intra-community trade...''
are to be construed as measures having equivalent effect to quotas. Thus it was the effect of the meausure that was important, not its purpose.
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