The Monticellonian., 1906-11-22
The War on the Standard.

et. Louis.-Petition filed in United States circuit court asking for disso lution of Standard Oil trust and per petual injunction restraining 70 con stituent companies from working with or paying dividends to parent com pany.
 New York.-Standard oil shares dropped 15 points, making net loss of 1b0 points since Roosevelts war on the trust began; total depreciation in stock since president opened crusade, $150.000,o00 this notwithstanding quarterly dividends of s10 per share.
 Findlay, O.-Prosecuting attorney directed by Attorney General Ellis to keep grand jury in session; all Stand ard oil officials may be indicted of ficials of Standard Oil company of Ohio indicted agreed to surrender.
 St. Louis, Mo.-The suit to break up the Standard Oil trust has been filed in the United States circuit court here. The petition asks:
 That the court decree that the com bination and conspiracy are unlawful under the sherman antitrust act
 That the Standard Oil company be enjoined, restrained and prohibited from exercising any control over It's allied corporations, or any of them, by the election or appointment of di- rectors or officers, or in any other manner.
 That the subsidiary corporations be enjoined from declaring or paying any dividends to the Standard Oil com pany of New Jersey.
 That the defendants, and each and all of them, be enjoined from entering into any contract, the purpose or eff feet of which is to restrain commerce in petroleum and it's products or to monopolize the same
 The petition contains 194 pages of printed matter. or about 100000 words, and an aditioIal S4 pages of exhibits, consisting of bylaws and minutes of Standard Oil meetings and retail prices of oil in every state and territory of the union.
 What tho Petition Alleges.
 It is alleged in the petition that John D. Rockefeller and his associ- ates, the other individual defendants, formed conspiracy to monopolize the commerce in petroleum and it's products at an early date-about the year 1S70-and that the same individ- uals have controlled the combination during all these years, in all its forms, and now control it. 1t was, therefore, deemed wise to state in the petition the complete history and growth of this conspiracy
 History of the Conspiracy.
 The petition is logically divided into three periods. During the first one of these periods, from 1870 to 1882, the combination assumed the form of simple onspiracy-that is to say, the defendants, with the Standard Oil company of Ohio, acted together to suppress competition and control the oil business
 During the second period, from 1882 to 1899, the combination assumed the form of trust agreement, whereby about 40 separate corporations en- gagged in the same business, turned over the management of their busi ness to nine trustees, of which these individual defendants were the major ity, so that these defendants con trolled all of these corporations.
 In March. 1892, the supreme court of Ohio declared this trust agreement void and ordered its dissolution.
 Thereupon, on March 21, 1892, the trust certificate holders met in New ork and resolved to dissolve the trust and appointed John D. Rockefeller, Henry NJ. Flagler, William Rockefel- Ter. John D. Archbold, Benjamin Brewster, Henry H. Rogers, Wesley liquidating trustees-the individual defendants being a majority of these trustees.
 The manner of liquidation was not to sell the property and divide the proceeds among the certificate hold CTS, nor to return to each person in- dividually the property placed in the trust. but all of the stocks in each of the companies were divided into portions in proportion to the number of trust certificate shares outstanding, so that Rockefeller and his associates continued to control all these corpor- ations as before
 Birth of the Present Trust.
 The petition then takes up the third period of the conspiracy, beginning with the formation. of the present trust
 In order to accomplish this, in Jan uary, 1899. they increased the stock