The daily telegram. [volume] (Clarksburg, W. Va.) 1901-1926, 1913-11-03
Governments Contentious
Showing 1t to Be a Trust in
Restraint Of Trade.
IN A FINAL STRUGGLE
To Break Up the Monopoly in
Certain Kinds of Farm
ing implements.
tnx Assee,s1Ep pnrss,

/ States district court for the final
struggle in the government suit to
4 dissolve the International Harvester
4 Company as monopoly in violation
OF the Sherman law. Members OF
the court gathered to hear final ar
guments in the case filed more than
a year and a half ago.
/ According to an announcement
made this morning after the certiti-
cate and report OF special examiner,
Robert s. Taylor. had been returned
to the court, counsel for the govern
ment will occupy the entire day ana
possibly a portion of tomorrow's
session in the presentation Of arsu-
ments. 1t was indicated that the
briefs and arguments of the defense
might take even longer.
Attorney General MciReynolds,
special assistant to the attorney gen
eral, and Joseph r. Darling, special
agent of the department OF justice,
represented the government.
The brief of the government
in its suit to dissolve as
an Illegal combination the In
lternational Harvester Company,
was submitted to the United States
district court here today by Attorney
General McReynolds. Reciting the
history of the organization of the
harvester company in 1902, 1t al
legged that the company has con-
trolled since that time about eighty
per cent OF the trade in the United
States in binders, mowers and other
agricultural implements, and prayed
the court to grant an Injunction
against its further continuance.
The suit is regarded by officials
here as one of the most important
undertaken by the Department Of
Justice in many years and the at
torney general not only wrote the
governments brief himself, hut he
and Edwin p. Grosvenor, the special
assistant who prepared the case; APP
peared in person to make oral argu-
ments before the court.
The attorney generals dissatisfae.
ton with pro rata distribution OF
the stocks OF dissolved combina-
lions such as occurred following the
DEGREES of the supreme court in the
Standard Oil and American Tobacco
cases is clearly indicated in the clos
ing paragraph of the brief. After
asking for an injunction to insure
the, restoration of competitive condl-
ditions, the brief said:
In order that the plan may es-
tablish condition in honest har-
mony with the law, 1t is imperative
that it shall disintegrate the business
OF the principal defendant in such
manner that no two of the disinte-
grated parts shall he acquired 'by or
come under the control of companies
having common stockholders or COM
panies otherwise under common
control or influence"
This Is one of the few government
prosecutions of a corporate combi-
nation, most of the big cases which
have been won in the supreme court
having been directed against holding
companies or mergers. The govern
ment contends, however, that the In
iternatiohal Company was formed
4 for the sole purpose of taking over
| the interstate business of several
companies engaged in selling har-
vesting implements, and that it was
| in effect the same sort OF a combi-
nation and monopoly as was CON
demned in the Tobacco Trust case,
The international Harvester Com
Ipany," the brief declared, was not
incorporated until the owners OF each
of the five companies had agreed to
sell out to 1t, and If there had not
been such an agreement the princi-
pal defendant would never have had
being. The direct, necessary and i'm
mediate effect of its incorporation
and immediate acquisition was an
undue suppression of competition
resulting in restraint of trade and
monopoly,
Under the undisputed facts the
/ formation of the international liar
iyester Company was not normal
and natural development of the COM
merce in harvesting machinery. 1t
was the child of one not therefore in
terested in the business, George W.,
Perkins, banker and insurance
man who stepped in at an opportune
time to bring the rival manufacture
ers together; he and others by means
Iof a combination in corporate form
destroyed competition and en-
trenched monopoly. The organiza-
ton OF the International Harvester
Company in 1902 has been followed
since that time by course of con-
duct on the part of the defendants
clearly demonstrating an Intent not
only to perpetuate their monopoly
of the harvesting business but
also to build up, by means Of and
upon their harvesting monopoly, g
monopoly of all the business in ag-
ricultural implements in the United
States"
The steps preliminary to the or
ganizatiou of the Harvester Com
lpany were taken in July. 1902, ac-
lcording to the brief, when Cyrus H.
Mccormick, Charles Deering, John j.
Glessner and William H. Jones, rep
Presenting the principal harvesting
companies, and George w. Perkins,
then of j. p. Morgan and Company.
i determined to effect combination.
i on July 2S, 1902, four Of the prin-
Y cipal companies executed identical
apreemenfS of transfer tn Nv C.