The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1907-03-10
THE FER LIzER
MEN ARE NOW
FREE
Supreme Court Hold that
Indictment Was Not
Sufficient.


IN this city:
The Fertilizer Trust cases, inyoiv-
ing the right of the United States 10
compel the removal OF indicted ofhc-
ials of the fertilizer companies con-
shutting the alleged trust from Vlr-
ginia to Tennessee for trial, were de-
cided yesterday by the United States
supreme court adversely to the gov
ernment's contentious. The opinion
was delivered by Chief Justice Fuller,
who held that the United States cir
cult court had erred in holding that
the Indictment was sufficient to Sc
cure the removal of the defendants
without regard to the evidence.
Chief Justice Fuller said that the
supreme court had never held that
in removal cases the Indictment OF
person was sufficient to secure his
transfer from one jurisdiction to an
other, "and," he added, I'VE now hold
that it is not" Removals should be
ordered, he said, only upon showing
sufficient cause for such a course;
that this could only be done by scru-
tiny of the evidence, and that to re-
fuse this investigation is denial of
the right guaranteed by the constitu-
ton.
Orders Defendants Discharge.
The court, therefore, reversed the
order of the circuit court for the re-
~a,x~aI IS n;,1Io.v o,d Tho 0fbor do
PENDANTS 10 Tennessee, and ordered
their discharge, but without prejudice
against the future proceedings in the
case.
The cases have attracted much at
tention and have been stubbornly
fought both by the government and
the trust officials ever since the be-
ginning of proceedings last May.
There were eleven cases before the
court, and all arose out of indict-
.ments returned by the federal grand
jury for the middle district of Ten.
nessee, sitting at Nashville, which
charged the defendants with conspir-
ing to regulate the price of fertilizers
in the states of North Carolina, South
Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Missis-
sippi, Louisiana and Tennessee, in
violation of the antitrust law of 1890
1t was charged in these indictments
that the combination controlled 80 pei
cent of the fertilizer product of the
country and that through the Colonial
Development Company as a common
medium prices were fixed and the
amount of sales regulated, the result
being a cost in the aggregate of MOI
less than 100000 to the farmers in
| the. states mentioned in excess OF
what it would be under a system per
hitting free and unrestricted compe
tition.
Twenty-Five indictments.
There were twenty-five indictment.
against the officers of the fertilizel
companies, but only eleven of then
have reached the supreme court
These were the cases against Jane:
G. Tinsley, president of the MARKETS.
Fertilizer Company, of Georgia; VIII
| liam De c. Kessier, secretary ant
treasurer of the Goulding Fertilize
Company, of Great Britain; Samue
T. Morgan, president; Fortesqu'
/ Whittle, vioe-president, and Frank E
/ Wilcox, agent and manager of tn,
/ Virginia-Carolina Chemical Company
| ]. Rice Smith, president of the Geor
gia Chemical Works; Austin B. Car
/ penter and Charles H MCDOWELL
agents of Armour & Co., of Chicago
/ George Baden, president of the Fed
eral Chemical Company, of Delawar,
and Kentucky. and Frank S. Royste
and Charles F. Burroughs, of the Roy
ster Guano Company, of Virginia. /
was charged that the goods wer
/ shipped from various places in Ken
lucky, Virginia and Illinois. The In
dicted men have been on bail, pend
ing the supreme courts action
Il The proceeding which terminate,
yesterday was merely preliminary
and did not go to the merits of tn
case. When taken into custody b,
the Virginia marshal, the defendant
appealed to the United States cilcui
court for writs of habeas corpus. OF
the ground that the Tennessee court
under the constitution, was incompe
tent TO try them for an offense whicl
had not been committed in that juris
diction. They contended that no oil
tense had been committed agains
the laws of the United States, bu
urged that even if there had bee
such offense, it had not been commit
ted in Tennessee, where none of then
lived.
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