The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1906-11-23
DISSOLVE TRUST
The United States Government Files
Suit Against Standard Oil
Company at St. Louis.
WOULD BREAK MONOPOLY
Seventy Corporations Are Charged
with Violating sherman Anti
Trust Law-CriminaI Pros
ecutiOns May Follow.

the initial move to dissolve the Stand
ard Oil, so-called monopoly, by filing
in the United States district court
in st. Louis a petition in equity
against the Standard Oil company OF
New Jersey and its seventy constitu-
ent corporations and partnerships, and
seven defendants, including John d.
Rockefeller and William Rockefeller,
asking the the combination be de-
clared unlawful and in the future en-
Joined from entering into any con-
tract or combination in restraint OF
trade. The suit is brought under the
Sherman antitrust act, which the
Standard and its constituent compa-
MES and the seven individuals defend
ants are charged with violating. In
a formal statement by Attorney Gen
eral Moody he says that criminal pros
ecution is reserved for future con-
sideration
The information available to the
department tends to show that the
various corporations, the 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 the
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 I'M
der the direction of the same persons,
in the main. down to the present
time, that these persons now surviv-
ing are John ID. Rockefeller, William
Rockefeller, Henry II. Rogers, Henry
M. Flager, John ID. Archbold, Oliver
H. Payne and Charles M. Pratt; that
the design throughout OF the persons
having control of the enterprise has
been to suppress competition in the
production, transportation and sale of
refined oil and to obtain, as FAR as
possible, monopoly therein; that be-
tween 1870 and 1882 the design was
effected through agreements made be-
tween many persons and corporations
engaged in this business; that in 1882,
the result aimed at was made more
certain by vesting in nine trustees
(including five of the above named
persons) sufficient stock in the 80
corporations concerned to enable the
trustees to control their operations
in such way that competition be-
tween them was suppressed; that
this plan was acted upon until it was
declared unlawful by the supreme
court of Ohio in an action against
the Standard Oil company, of Ohio
one of said corporations, in 1892; that
during the seven years following che
same individual defendants, as ma
jority of the liquidating trustees, were
pretending to liquidate the trust, but
as matter of fact were managing
all of the corporations in the same
way and exercising the same control
over them: that the individual defend
ants, in 1899, increased the stock OF
the Standard Oil company of New
Jersey from $4,000, 900 to $40, 100000;
that said company was then pro-
ducing and selling corporation, and
they added to its corporate powers
the power Of purchasing stock in
other companies and practically all
of the powers exercised by the trus-
tees under the unlawful trust agree
ment 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
Heretofore held and controlled by
the trustees, paying there for by the
issue of its own shares in exchange;
that the president of the board OF
trustees became the president of the
Standard Oil company of New Jer-
sey, and the same persons( the indi-
vidual defendants) who had directed
the business then assumed the direc-
ton of the business of the Standard
Oil company of New Jersey and ever
since continued it; that the purpose
and effect of the use of the Standard
Oil company of New Jersey as
holding company was precisely the
same as the purpose and effect of the
appointment of the trustees hereinbe-
fore referred to, namely, to suppress
competition between the corporations
and limited partnerships. whose stock
was first held by the trustees and
then by the Standard Oil company of
New Jersey; that by the foregoing
methods, aided by the establishment
of railroad rates for transportation
which Disseminated in favor of the
corporations, whose stock was held
by the holding company, that COM
pany has been enabled to obtain. In
large sections of the country, mo-
nopoly of the sale of refined oil, with
the result that the prices to the con-
sumner within the territory where the
monopoly prevails are very much
higher than within the territory