The Waterbury Democrat., 1939-03-07

Cation trust prosecution is begun, the leaders in the in- dustry affected usually come in to the Department of Justice and try to work out some method of eliminating the abuses complained of. If they work out a satisfac- tory one, Arnold takes it to court and a consent decree is obtained But Arnold wants to run law office-not laboratory in business methods. He believes that it is the job of the antitrust division to in- stitute and prosecute suits, and in- sists that if that job is done right he needs a staff the size of the SEC, with regional offices.
 NO JOB ... FOR LAWYERS
 The job of negotiating with busi- ness men on business methods, of eliminating price fixing devices and restraints of trade that, as he sees it, is job for business experts in some other agency of govern ment. He figures that lawyers don't know enough about such things, and that it isn't part of the func- tion of prosecuting anyway. The advice whick his proposed commission would give would not merely be negative. That is, 1t would not stop at telling corpor- ations and trade associations what they might not do; it would tell them what they could do, within the antitrust law framework, to attain desired ends.
 | Primary purpose of this set-up
 would be to restore the essential
 clements of free competition to a
 complex industralized society in
 which a considerable measure of
 cartelization is inevitable. Broadly
 speaking, it would be an attempt
 to halt what Arnold considers a
 process of capitalization in cap-
 italism.
 How would the scheme work? Well, take any big industry in any city-the milk industry, for ex- ample. If milk is to get dis tributed. some sort of organization or combination is necessary; after all, the farmer can't hitch up and drive downtown from door to door peddling milk Somewhere, some- how, farmer and dairy and dis tributor and driver have got to work out some sort of arrangement for handling the milk.
 HOW IT WOULD WORK
 Suppose they do-and then sup- pose Gas sometimes happen) that the antitrust division of the De- partment of Justice prosecutes tllem for forming a combination in re- straint of trade.
 Under this new system they would go to the commission with their troubles. On the commission there would be experts in the milk business-experts from the Depart mept of Agriculture, perhaps. In any case, the commission and the industry would work out plan of combination and submit it to the antitrust division. If this outfit found the plan within the rule of reason" which guides antitrust procedure (of which, more in a momenD the plan would be okayed and a three-year consent decree would be effected.
 If, on the other hand, the at- torney general should hold that
 the plan went far beyond the
 antitrust law, theH the commits
 sion would lay the problem before
 Congress and say, in effect: Here we need special legislation to
 meet this problem. What can you do for us?"
 In effect, then, says Arnold, the antitrust division of the Depart ment of Justice would function as traffic cop-alid the commission would be the body charged with saying what lights went on what corners.
 Now as to this rule of reason" It simply means that combina- ton may be justified if the sav- ings it effects are passed on to the consumer and that restrictions may be justified if they don't in- terfere with orderly marketing. It also recognizes that where com- petition actually has been de- stroyed and a great combination has developed, the dissolution must be accomplished reasonably -and not, as Arnold puts it, with an ax.
 Copyright, 1889, NEA Service, Incl