The Washington herald., 1911-05-16
WALL STREET NEWS
Standard Oil Decision Topic
sS of Chief Interest.
NOW AWAIT To.DAY's OPENING
News from Warrington Comes After
Days session-Constructi of the
Anti-trust Law Not Fenred-Ameri-
can Tobacco Case Remains-Jus-
tice White Il Conservative.

New York, May 1b.-Ahhough no more
sure cause was afforded than has been at
any time in the past. yet expectation was
general and pronounced In Wall street
this morning that before the day was
over the Supreme Court would hand
down a decision in one or both Of the
two great trust cases that IT has been
holding under consideration for so long
time.
When the stock exchange adjourned at
o'clock with the Supreme Court still in
session the greater number Of financial
people in Wall street waited for an hour
longer to see If any important news from
Washington would be forthcoming. FL
nally the announcement was made that
the Supreme Court had held in one of the
cases that the Standard Oil Company
had violated the first and second sec
tions Of the Sherman law, and had or
dered the dissolution of the corporation.
1t was evident. however, that future
bulletins concerning the nature Of the
decision would probably continue in frag-
mentary form for an indefinite time to
come. and that accurate knowledge of the
decision itself, and also as to what &C
| ton, II any, the Supreme Court took in
the American Tobacco case, could not be-
come available for practical comprehen-
sion until the detailed reports Of the tudg-
ment were published in the morning news
papers. Therefore Wall street generally
shut its doors and went home.
As regards what was definitely known,
namely that as a matter Of form the
decision was against the Standard OIL
Company. this was only what 80 out of
100 intelligent persons in the financial
district had looked for.
White Gives Judgment.
Interest in the matter, Of course. CEN
tiers almost entirely in the general ex-
position and construction of the anti
trust law that has been made by the
country's supreme judicial tribunal, and
from the fact that the judgment Of the
court was to-day pronounced by Mr..
Justice White recognized as one OF the
most conservative and right-thfnking
members Of the body and man who has
always heretofore favored a reasonable
and commen-sense construction Of the
Sherman antitrust statute. Wall street
was inclined to take strong hope that
what must now in all probability be re-
garded as the final upshot of this matter
would assume a shape that would be
satisfactory to the business interests of
the land.
1t was at least significant of a rather
optimistic temper on the part of Wall
street that, restricted as stock exchange
dealings were, the tendency Of prices
was upward or was at least of what is
technically a Hardening character.
The full report Of the country's foreign
trade for April. which was published be-
fore the opening of business, contained
proof Of the highly interesting and graft
flying circumstances that exports from
the country Of other articles than those
produced upon the farms are enlarging
in a decided manner. Exports for April
were sl5S, ,00o, ,O00 nearly s26.ooo.000 greater
than in the corresponding month last
year, while imports were almost s14.000,-
900 less than in April 1919.
AS II was there was an excess balance
in our favor of exports over imports of
S37,S16,0J0 compared with an import
excess Of $751; in April a year ago.
This statement was a good deal better
than seemed likely a few days since,
when the record of exports of domestic
products showed a falling off of over
100000 In exports of cotton and an in
crease of only $4,000 over those of last
year.
The figures of the Department of Agri-
culture on the value of the produce of the
farms of the country during 1910 estimates
the total wealth proceeding from this
source at S. 926 10000 an increase of
S10i, 200 over 1909. An interesting point
about the agricultural year 1910 Is that
Texas won from Illinois the place of be-
ing the first State of the Union in the
value of farm produce, this being due to
its heavy crop of cotton.