Waterbury evening Democrat., 1906-11-15
ATTORNEY GENERAL
 MOODY IS ACTIVE Standard Oil Company Must Answer For Infringement of the Sherman
 Anti-Trust Act
PETITION FILED AT ST LOUIS
It Asks That the Company and Its Constituent Corporations Be
 Declared Unlawful.

Washington, Nov b. = Attorney
 General Moody to-day acting through the resident United
 States district attorney. instituted proceedings against the Standard Oil company of New Jersey under the
 sherman anti-trust act, by filing .n
 the United States circuit court at St
 Louis a petition in equity against 1t and its seventy constituent corpora tions and partnerships and seven in dividual defendants, asking that the combination be declared unlawful and in the future enjoined from en- terlng into any contract or combina-
 ton in restraint of trade, etc.
 The following statement was pre- pared and made public by Attorney General Moody today:
 Tn June last, by direction of the president, Messrs Kell0g and Morri-
 son were appointed by me, special as-
 sistant attorneys general, to act with assistant to the Attorney General
 Purdy, to make an Investigation of the relations of the Standard oil com pany of New Jersey, to the business of refining, transporting distributing and selling oil throughout the United
 States; to ascertain all the facts, and report whether or not in their opinion there has been violation of the
 sherman antitrust law by the stand ard Oil company of New Jersey or thu ,,oronus r,.. nary,orn tiopc 1 to koI
 with or managing 1t.
 The counsel have completed that duty and the report of their investi- gation has received careful considera- tion by the president and his cabinet.
 '"The information available to the department tends to show that the various corporations and limited part nerships under the control, in the manner hereinafter stated, of the Standard oil company. of New Jersey produce, transport and sell about % per cent of the refined oil produced, transported and sold In the United States for domestic use. and about tho same proportion of refined oil ex- ported from the United States; that this share of the business has been procured by course of action which beginning in 1870, has continued un- der the direction of the same persons, in the main, down to the present time; that these persons now surviv- ing are John D. Rockefeller, William Rockefeller. Henry II. Rogers, Henry NJ. Flagler the design throughout of persons having control of the enter prise has been to, suppress competl- tion in the production, transportation and sale of refined oil, and to obtain, as far as possible, monopoly there in; that between 1870 and 1882 the design was affected through agree ments made between many persons and corporations engaged in this busi- ness; that in 1882 the result aimed at was made more certain by vesting in nine trustees Gncluding five of the above named persons) sufficient to stock in the thirty-nine corporations concerned to enable the trustees to control their operations in such way that competition between them was suppressed; that this plan was acted upon until 1t was declared unlawful by the supreme court of Ohio in an action against the Standard Oil com pany of ohio, one of said corporations in 1892: that during the seven years following the same individual de- fendants, as a majority of the liqui- dating trustees. were pretending to llquidate the trust, but as matter of fact were managing all of the cor porations in the same way and excr- cising the same control over th,m: that the individual defendants in 1899 increased the stock of the Standard oil company of New Jersey from SlOOOO.000 to S110.000.0O0; that said company was then a producing and selling corporation. and they added to It's corporate powers the power of stock in other companies and practically all of the powers ex- ercised by the trustees under the un- lawful trust agreement of 1882; that the Standard oil company of New Jersey. then taking the place of the trustees, acquired all of the stock of the corporations therefore held and by the trustees, paying therefor by the issue of It's own shares in exchange: that the presi- dent of the board of trustees became the president of the Standard oil Co of New Jersey. and the same persons (the individual defendants) who had directed the business of the trust then assumed the direction of the business of the Standard oil Co of New Jersey and ever since continued it; that the purpose and effect of the use of the Standard oil Go of New Jersey es a holding company vas pre- ciseiy the same as the purpose and effect of the appointment of the trus- tees hereinbefore referred to. name iy. to suppress competition between the corporations and limited partner ships whose stock vas first held by the trustees and then by the Stand ard oil Co of New Jersey: that by the foregoing methods. aided by the establishment of railroad rates for which discriminsted in favor of the corporations vhose stock vas held by the holding com p.ny. that company has been enabled to obtain, fn large sections of the a monopoly of the sale of refined of. with the result that the prices to the consumer within the ter rftory where the monopoly prevsil< are very much higher than within the territory where coDDe<iffon fo nuDe