Opinion ID: 303595
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Statute's Treatment of Antitrust Considerations

Text: 20
21 The language of Section 15 is concerned with the implementation of agreements, which definitely includes understandings, conferences, and other arrangements, among common carriers by water. The first six categories specified in Section 15 refer to agreements which of necessity imply the continued existence of the parties and their participation in such agreements over time (e. g., fixing or regulating rates; pooling or apportioning earnings, losses, or traffic; allotting ports or restricting sailings between ports, etc.). In the case at bar, however, Oceanic is eliminated from the North American Pacific Coast-Australasian trade (as well as any others), at least until it decides to reenter the trade by acquiring vessels and related personnel and equipment. The seventh category is intended merely to summarize the type of agreements covered-those in any manner providing for an exclusive, preferential, or cooperative working arrangement; 4 and not to include those of an entirely different nature, such as involved here-the acquisition of all the assets of one common carrier by water by another-which can hardly be considered mere working arrangements. 22 This view is supported by the language in the second and third paragraph, immediately following paragraph one, in Section 15. The second paragraph authorizes the Commission to disapprove, cancel or modify any agreement whether or not previously approved by it which it finds to be unjustly discriminatory. The third paragraph in Section 15 declares existing agreements lawful until disapproved by the Commission. Both of these paragraphs of Section 15 undeniably envision agreements which are amenable to continuing Commission supervision. If changing conditions warrant it, the Commission may find a working arrangement hitherto not considered unfair to be unjustly discriminatory, and thus order its dissolution or modification. In the case of arrangements of a more permanent nature such as here involved, the sale of all the assets of one common carrier by water to another, subsequent Commission cancellation or modification of such a previously approved arrangement would be very difficult if not impossible to implement. The whole structure of Section 15, not only the first paragraph listing the type agreement covered, shows an intent to grant the Commission authority to deal with agreements of a continuing nature. 5 23
24 Aside from the specific language of Section 15, a contrary reading of its scope regarding agreements covered is likewise not warranted in view of the fundamental import of the nation's antitrust policies, expressed by Congress in a variety of legislative enactments, primarily the Sherman Act. 6 The Supreme Court has long recognized that the antitrust laws represent a fundamental national economic policy . . . 7 and stated that [r]epeals of the antitrust laws by implication from a regulatory statute are strongly disfavored, and have only been found in cases of plain repugnancy between the antitrust and regulatory provisions. 8 Even where Congress has granted exemptions from the antitrust laws, the Court has held that it is bound to construe them strictly, since . . . [they are] restrictive of a free economy. 9 With specific reference to situations such as that presented by the case at bar, the Court has stated that it cannot lightly assume that the enactment of a special regulatory scheme for particular aspects of an industry was intended to render the more general provisions of the antitrust laws wholly inapplicable to that industry. 10 25 This court has recently applied this principle, and in so doing observed: 26 . . . [T]he basic philosophy of our antitrust policy has been so long established, is of such recognized economic importance, and has assumed in the statutory scheme of things such high dignity that a contrary congressional intent or immunity from the antitrust laws 'is not lightly implied.' 27 . . . [T]he proper inquiry [in cases such as this one] would seem to be to what extent Congress has knowingly adopted a policy contrary to or inconsistent with the previously established antitrust laws. . . . 28 Putting the problem in this light, relevant criteria would include the specific language of the congressional statute involved, any legislative history which would throw light on the congressional intent, the relative importance of the governmental action which is asserted to override antitrust policy, whether the governmental agency is required to take into consideration the possible anticompetitive effect of its actions, whether the agency is required to adhere to a clearly defined and restricted statutory directive, and to what extent the agency's actions are subject to judicial review. 11 29 In the same case, this court, in considering federal government regulation of business, stated with specific reference to the scope of the Federal Maritime Commission's authority to grant exemptions from the antitrust laws: 30 The maritime industry operates under the power of the Federal Maritime Commission specifically to grant exemptions from the antitrust laws. This power is not to be exercised loosely, hence in Federal Maritime Commission v. Aktiebolaget Svenska Amerika Linien (Swedish American Line) [390 U.S. 238, 88 S.Ct. 1005, 19 L.Ed.2d 1071] the [Supreme] Court upheld the Commission regulation that shipping conference restraints which interfere with the policies of the antitrust laws will be approved only [emphasis in original] if the conferences can show that they are required by a serious transportation need, necessary to secure important public benefits or in furtherance of a valid regulatory purpose of the Shipping Act. 12 (Emphasis added.) 31
32 As the Supreme Court has recognized in regard to exemptions from the antitrust laws, [i]f Congress had desired to grant any further immunity, Congress doubtless would have said so. 13 This view is supported by an examination of two contemporary statutes of the Shipping Act: Enacted in 1912, the Panama Canal Act in amending Section 5 of the Interstate Commerce Act dealt specifically with interlocking ownership or control of common carriers by water by making it unlawful for any railroad to own, . . . control, or have any interest whatsoever (by stock ownership or otherwise, either directly, indirectly, through any holding company, or by stockholders or directors in common, or in any other manner) in any common carrier by water operated through the Panama Canal or elsewhere with which the railroad may compete; 14 enacted in 1914, Section 7 of the Clayton Act speaks in terms of the acquisition by one corporation of the [whole or any part of the] stock of another and is directed at controlling corporate mergers. 15 33 It is highly unlikely, in view of this specific statutory treatment by Congress of the antitrust implications of acquisitions of corporate control, that Congress originally intended to exempt such acquisitions under Section 15 of the Shipping Act by making no specific reference to them but simply by including them under the rubric agreement. On the contrary, the silence of Congress in Section 15 with respect to the subject of acquisition of control or ownership can only be taken to mean that Congress had no intention by the Shipping Act of 1916 to exempt such arrangements from the normal administration of the antitrust laws. The Federal Maritime Commission's attempt to derive a contrary affirmative intent on the part of Congress from its silence is not a favored method of statutory interpretation. 16 34 It would therefore be illogical to read the language of Section 15 as applying to agreements other than those which provide for exclusive, preferential, or working arrangements, since to do so would be to change the clear intent of Congress as to the usual standards and responsibility for administration of the antitrust laws without specific language so requiring. This is by no means intended to denigrate the functions of the Federal Maritime Commission with respect to cooperative working agreements among common carriers by water; rather it is designed simply to delineate the appropriate scope for such functions in light of other significant national concerns, here the antitrust laws. 35 On the face of the statute, the language of Section 15 does not vest the Commission with jurisdiction over the type of agreement here at issue-the acquisition of all the assets of one common carrier by water by another carrier. This is not to say, or imply, that this agreement must therefore of necessity be considered void as violative of the antitrust laws. Whether it should be considered valid or invalid is a matter for evaluation first by the appropriate antitrust enforcement agency, and subsequently if a dispute arises by the courts. 36