Court Opinion

ID: 9427030
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:19:29.937469+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:04.585911
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Powell,
dissenting.
I join The Chief Justice in his dissent, and add a word to emphasize my difficulty with the Court’s decision.
The issue is whether the antitrust laws of this country are to be made available for treble-damages suits against American businesses by the governments of other countries. The Court resolves this issue in favor of such governments by construing the word “person” in § 4 of the Clayton Act to include *330“foreign governments.” No one argues seriously that this was the intent of Congress in 1890 when the term “person” was included in the Act. Indeed, the Court acknowledges that this “question was never considered at the time the Sherman and Clayton Acts were enacted.” Ante, at 312.
Despite this conclusion as to the absence of any congressional consideration, the inviting possibility of treble damages is extended today by judicial action to the sovereign nations of the world.1 With minor exceptions, the United States recognizes the governments of all of these nations. We may assume that most of them have no equivalent of our antitrust laws and would be unlikely to afford reciprocal opportunities to the United States to sue and recover damages in their courts.
The Court has resolved a major policy question. As the Acting Solicitor General stated in his Memorandum for the United States as Amicus Curias, filed March 23, 1977:
“Whether foreign sovereigns are 'persons’ entitled to sue under Section 4 depends largely upon the general policy reflected in the statute, and the general policy of the United States opening its courts to foreign sovereigns.”
I had thought it was accepted doctrine that questions of “general policy” — especially with respect to foreign sovereigns and absent explicit legislative authority — are beyond the province of the Judicial Branch. If the statute truly reflected a general policy that dictated the inclusion of foreign sovereigns, the Court might be justified in reaching today’s result. In Georgia v. Evans, 316 U. S. 159 (1942), a clear policy to protect the States of the Union was reflected in the antitrust laws and in the legislative history. The Court could “perceive no reason for believing that Congress wanted to deprive a State, as purchaser of commodities shipped in interstate commerce, of the civil remedy of treble damages which is available *331to other purchasers who suffer through violation of the Act.” Id., at 162.
Unlike the majority, I do not believe the same can be said with respect to foreign sovereigns. See ante, at 318. It is not only the absence of specific congressional intent to include them. It is that the predicate for the Court's approach in Georgia v. Evans is not present in the case before us. The solicitude that we assume Congress has for the welfare of each of the United States, especially when the subject matter of legislation largely has been removed from the competence of the States and has been entrusted to the United States, cannot be assumed with respect to foreign nations. Putting it differently, it was not illogical for the Evans Court to include the States within the reach of § 4, but it is a quantum leap to include foreign governments.
A court, without the benefit of legislative hearings that would illuminate the policy considerations if the question were left to Congress, is not competent in my opinion to resolve this question in the best interest of our country. It is regrettable that the Court today finds it necessary to rush to this essentially legislative judgment.2

 At present there are 162 sovereign nations.

 The Court quotes a letter to the effect that “the Department of State would not anticipate any foreign policy problems” if § 4 were held to embrace suits by foreign governments. Ante, at 319 n. 20 (emphasis supplied). But resolution of the issue here depends not only upon foreign policy considerations but also upon considerations relevant to the general welfare of the United States. The latter are quite beyond the concern of the Department of State and should be considered by the Legislative Branch. The international business conducted by American corporations has economic and social ramifications of great importance to our country.