The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-10-19
VANHOOSE SAYS LITIGATION WAS
 ENTIRELY USELESS Tells How He Asked Depart partment of Justice to
 Lay Down Rules
ASSOCIATION WAS
 EAGER TO CONFORM
As President of Grocers He Repeat edly Requested Information as to What Steps They
 Should Take


 That he repeatedly requested the de- partment of justice to outline the erro- neus methods of the Southern Wholesale Grocers' association, if there were any. and that if his voluntary and repeated request had been accepted the injunction against that association recorded Tues- day would have been unnecessary, was the statement yesterday of James A. vanHoose of this city, former president of that association In a statement, MT. VanHoose says that he has habitually re- 1 trained from commenting upon the gro cers' case, but that as the injunction has been recorded he does not think it would be immodest or unbecoming to say thaS he is pleased with the situation and to a few inside pointers in connection with the operations of that organization before the dissolution suit was brought
 MT. VanHoose said
 'The injunction filed in the United States court of appeals Tuesday applying the rule of reason to the operation of that association is pleasing to me personally, and I am sure the members of the asso- citation feel no disappointment as to tho course the case has taken. The injunction does not restrain the association from so- | ing ahead as gentlemen should and carry ing on their cooperative work as we de- sired to do under the requested course to have been outlined by the department of justice.
 Invited by Association
 "The whole case from the beginning to the end was invited by the association to this extent: As president of the South l ern Wholesale Grocers association l went 1 to Washington with a personal letter ot l introduction to Attorney General Wick ersham, signed by the late Joseph Mont go mery. at that time special assistant district attorney.s I interviewed MT. FL l lis who at that time had in hand the so- called trust cases. I said to him that the department of justice had no doubt heard rumors about the association and that I had come to him to get some advice. 1 "i said to MT. Ellis that we invited him 1 or any of his assistants to attend our meetings and see for his own personal l satisfaction how we operated them. also urged repeatedly that the depart ment Of justice outline some plan wherein we would not be subjected to any criti- cism and wherein we would be operating 1 within the law.
 Mind you, l did not confess to him i that I agreed with the department of justice in the assertion that our associa- ton was violating the law I merely said ttfr we would concede that the viewpoint of the department of justice was the cor rect one, and proceeding upon that as- sumption we would adopt any rules or even dissolve as he saw fit to advise us. He told me that 1t was not the business of the department of justice to advise trusts how to act and that he could not see how he could proceed under the ur- gent invitation we gave him as a repre- sentative of the United States department of justice. It is manifestly absurd to think that a set of merchants and gen. tIemen would have made such an offer if they believed that any injury would come to them It was plain, fair, open and above board effort to get our association in tn, right channel, according to the interpretation of the Sherman law. Had Not Rendered Decision
  iand had not rendered any decision inter- p.eting the sherman law. Thereupon l said to MT. Ellis: T am not prophet or the son of porphet, MT. Ellis, but mark N hat I say to you: There is to come a. time soon when the supreme court of this country will direct you to outline to the business interests of this country the way t.ey should go. They will define the tn- tention of a set of men and their acts and you will be forced to guide them arght if they go wrong by direct order of thi; highest tribunal of America
 He feaffirmed that it was not his busi- ness to direct us and upon subsequent in- terviews l found it impossible to impress upon the officials our intense desire to conform to all the laws, although we were far from admitting that we were violat- ing any of them.
 ''Viewing the matter from an impersonal standpoint, I believe if that offer made ty the Southern Wholesale Grocers' asso- citation president had been accepted this could have been said to the other great business organizations: See here, here is an organization representing millions of capital in the south. They have asked us to instruct them as to the Sherman law What about all of you considering ,h:s proposition and let us get down to a sane situation?
 If the offer of our association had Jeen accepted, and if the department of justice had given that proposition to the other business rsan, I do not believe that all this trust busting would been started
 Was Useless Proceedings
 t1,sy, rj,af iir. TLe recent case here against the South ern Wholesale Grocers association was the most useless proceedings that has ever been recorded in this country. They issued an injunction according to the rules laid down by the department of justice. This happened after innumer- able expenses had been incurred. This