Opinion ID: 1473637
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Claims Three and Four

Text: These claims we shall break into Claim A and Claim B and C, since that is a more convenient division. Claim A was for milk delivered by producers or feeders to four plants of the Borden Company, and to two small plants of the plaintiff. That delivered to the first Borden plant  the Belmont plant  was there made into cream and delivered to a second Borden plant at Newark; that delivered to the other three Borden plants  Brisben, Pine Bush and Deposit  and to the two small plants of the plaintiff, was delivered as milk to the Borden plant at Newark, where some of it was made into cream and mixed with that which had come as cream to the Newark plant from the Belmont plant. What remained of this milk does not concern us. All the cream, both that made at Newark and that delivered there as cream, was then shipped to the Borden plant at Paterson in an approved county, whence it was sold in ways not material. The Belmont plant was operated by the Borden's Manufacturing Products Division of the Borden Company, and until October 1, 1939, the other plants were operated by the Borden Farm Products Division of that company. We assume, since there is nothing to the contrary in the record, that these Divisions did not represent separate jural persons, but only a convenient distribution of operative management. From October 1, 1939 forward, all the Borden plants here involved, except the Belmont, were operated by a new corporation then organized  Borden Farm Products of New Jersey, Inc. Whether these plants were transferred to the new company and what was the relation between it and the main Borden Company, is not clear; we shall assume for argument that it was an independent corporation, and that after October 1, 1939, the cream which passed from the Belmont plant to the Newark plant was sold. We take first the milk which came to the Belmont plant and which was there made into cream and delivered as such to the Newark plant. At the Belmont plant it was properly classified as II-A unless it was within III-D. Until October 1, 1939, it could not have been classified as III-D, because the Newark plant was not a purchaser, for reasons which we have already given in discussing Claim Two. After October 1, 1939, even though we consider the transfer as delivery to a purchaser, the cream was nevertheless not within III-D because the Borden Company which owned the Newark plant, was a handler by virtue of its ownership of other plants. Nor could the cream be otherwise classified at the Newark plant itself, because the delivery was not to a purchaser, and because it would have been to a handler, if the Paterson plant had been a purchaser. Taking next the milk which came to the Brisben, Pine Bush and Deposit plants, it could not properly be classified otherwise than as I-A at those plants, for it left them as milk, and only cream comes within III-D. Nor could it be classified as III-D at the Newark Borden plant, because, although it was there made into cream, it was not delivered to a purchaser, and if it had been, the purchaser was a handler. Finally, taking the milk delivered to the plaintiff's small plants, it could properly be classified only as I-A at those plants, because, although delivered to a purchaser, it was not in the form of cream. At the Newark plant, though made into cream, it could not be classified as III-D for the reasons already given in the case of the other cream delivered to the Paterson plant. The plaintiff invokes a memorandum of Harmon, the Administrator at the time, made on December 8, 1938, which declared that when milk is diverted from a strictly fluid receiving station to a separating station, and from there on to a manufacturing plant, the manufacturing plant    is the second plant where the product moved as cream. Assuming this to be a proper interpretation, it does not apply here, because the Paterson plant was not a manufacturing plant, but only a distributing plant. Part A of Claims Three and Four was, therefore, properly dismissed. Parts B and C of Claims Three and Four concerned milk, all of which was delivered after October 1, 1939, by producers or feeders to a Borden plant at Oxford, there made into cream and transferred to another Borden plant at Washingtonville in an approved county. Thence it was transferred to four other Borden plants, three of which were in unapproved counties, and one in an approved county. If we reckon the Oxford plant as the first, the cream as it left for the Washingtonville plant did not go to a purchaser: hence it was not within III-D. If classified at the Washingtonville plant, it was not within III-D because it was not delivered to a purchaser. Parts B and C of Claims Three and Four were also properly dismissed.