Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-04-29
COURTS POSITION IS
ATTACKED IN BRIEF
Of SOLICITOR KING
Corporation Is Indirectly
CIassed as Criminal, and
Jeopafdizing of. Other SIM
liar Cases Is Pointed Out

WASHINGTON, April 2S.-The
gvernment today asked the supreme
court for a rehearihg of the anti
trust case against the United States
Steel corporation, recently decided
adversely to the government.
The request for the reopening of
the case was made by Solicitor Cen
eral King, representing the depart
ment of justice, shortly after the
court convened at noon. D..
The action will reopen the long
fight the federal s-&5ernment has
! made to dissolve the steel c.s'v->Ss..
ton and have = s3acSalaSFa evmp1na-
ton in restraint of trade. The court
absolved the corporation from the
charges of illegal combination made
by the government by a 4-to-3 vote.
The brief of the government in
asking the rehearing sharply attacks
the position of the court taken in its
opinion of the steel case that mere
size does not constitute violation
of laws prohibiting commissions in
restraint of trade.
Position Attacked
mo criminal is exonerated from
punishment because he makes . uisa
use of property so acquired, and no
criminal commission should bs
empted from the pains and nena1ties
u the sherman act, because after
having achleVed its lawful ends. il
merely maintains the fruits of i+y
Illegal acts without seeking dailv 70
commit new ones" the rehearjne
orlef Of the government states.
me court probably will announca
ne1ore adjournment in June Wbetba,
l" Will grant the governments 20.
q"est 1of the reopening of the cases
@Aiother point made by the pov
eminent was that the decision go.
oe rendered b va majority Of III.
court as, due to disqualification ..
'ustlcesl Brandeis and McReynoIds
only TOUR justices joined in abso1i'
ing the corporation from charges ~
violating the Sherman antitrust lo,p
me brief further declared: 1913
~ the United States Steel ron
poratlon was criminal combinatio,,
IN l9O1 and the brief apparently con
ceoes thatI it was a criminal combi-
natlon In 1911. and it, is a criminal
combination now.
Vhlle this case has been ARMED
twice. yet "a sense of official duty. .
oeller That the principal point in
vowed is really not decided bv tbe
majority opinion and would require
reversal, coupled with the heller
OF counsel that the effect Of the do
clsion is materially to cbanee aud
iestrlct number of recent opinions
Oh this court constituting the anti
trust statutes and may seriously af
lect other cases still pending as well
as the future enforcement of those
ACTS mas convinced counsel for the
United States that their DUTY re-
qulre them most earnestly to ask for
a. rehearing.
Failure to Discuss Point,
1T is respectfully insisted that the
opinion fails to discuss the cues
tlon pressed most strongly by coun-
Sell /. e., that the corporation is a
combination in restraint of trade.
apparently, therefore, the opin-
ion conceded that crime was com
mitted by the perpetrators of the
steel corporation. The criminal COM
olnatlon is permitted to continue,
however, because,
"(D Mere size is not a. violation
of law.
"(b) Because it did not achieve a
100 per cent. monopoly,
"Oc) Because it dod not Cypress
competitors
"((d) Several attorneys general
failed to file suit.
"(e) Dissolution involves risk of
injury to the public interest"
Criminal Combination
Notwithstanding these considera-
tons we earnestly insist that a GRIM
NAL combination should be not per-
united to continue it's suppression of
competition between the constituent
members of the combination"
The steel corporation" the gov
eminent further charged, "is a, COM
bination of combinations, by which
or indirectly, approximately
$50 Independent concerns were
brought under one business control,
thereby giving it no only the assets
and business Of that number of pro-
ducers, but the advantage of their
from the field of com
petition. The control ackquired over
the branches of the industry to
which the combina tons practically
related measured by the amount Of
production, extended in some in
stances from 80 per cent. to 995 per
cent. of the entire output of the
country, resulting in the immediate
increase of prices, in GONE cases
double and in others treble wat
they were before, yielding large div-
dends upon greatly inflated capital.