Court Opinion

ID: 9419153
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:46:52.249196+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:15.796994
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Black,
dissenting.
In order to give purchasers of goods an opportunity to buy them at prices fixed by competitiye trade, the Sherman Act made it illegal to fix prices by combination or conspiracy. It is difficult for me to believe that Congress did not intend to give equal protection to all purchasers similarly injured. In my judgment, no language of that Act, nothing in its history, and no argument now presented for our consideration makes necessary the conclusion that Congress intended to discriminate in favor of some purchasers and against others. It would require clear and unequivocal statutory language to persuade me that Congress intended to grant a remedy to all except one of those who were injured by trust prices — the “all” including every natural and artificial person, every corporation and association,* 1 foreign and domestic, and the single exception *616being the United States, which buys more goods and services than any other single purchaser.* 2 No such clear and unequivocal statutory language exists. And no plausible reason has been hazarded to prove that the government as a purchaser of goods needs less protection from unlawful combinations than do other buyers.3 Many deplorable instances in our history, in fact, indicate the contrary. Congress, no doubt stimulated to action by these historical occurrences, has by numerous enactments recognized the urgent necessity for safeguarding governmental purchases of goods and services against unfair and collusive price-fixing. To that end, competitive bidding as a prerequisite to government contracts has been the general statutory rule over a long period of years, and combinations to deprive the government of the advantages of such competition have been made criminal. It is therefore strange indeed that the Sherman Act, the greatest of all legislative efforts to make competition, not combination, the law of trade, should now be found to afford a greater protection against collusive price-fixing to every other buyer in the United States than is afforded to the United States itself.
So much for what seems to me to be the logical approach to the problem, and the one that should cause us to say that the government can sue for damages. If, however, we apply familiar canons of construction, I think we are led to the same result. For it is a primary principle that a law should be construed so as to carry *617out its purpose, in the light of the evil aimed at and the protection intended to be afforded. Here, among the evils legislated against was price-fixing by combination, and among the remedies afforded was the giving of a right of action to purchasers injured by prices so fixed. The result of this case — denying to the largest single purchaser of all goods manufactured and sold in the nation the protection afforded by this legislation — is to restrict the remedy in such way that the evil aimed at is less likely to be suppressed. For the construction given the Sherman Act, insofar as sales to the government and civil damages are concerned, enables those guilty of violating it to elude its provisions, escape its consequences, and defeat its objects.
Nor do I believe that the previous failure of the Attorneys General of the United States to bring actions similar tó this should be deemed a persuasive reason to read the government out of the Act’s benefits. The 1926 statement of the Attorney General to the effect that “the United States ... is not a party to suits under” § 7 does not supply such a reason. For in the quoted statement the Attorney General did not take the position that the government lacked the power to sue for civil damages; apparently what he had reference to was the fact that the Sherman Act did not make the United States a party to actions for civil damages by private persons against private persons. We do not know and cannot possibly determine why no prior suits were instituted for the benefit of the government. To assign reasons for such inaction is but to guess. And the guesses would doubtless vary almost in accordance with the preconceived notions of the guessers. But whatever might have been the reasons behind the government’s failure to sue, sure it is that the Attorney General is not the purchasing agent of the government. He cannot be assumed to have constant knowledge of the manifold prob*618leras that face those who buy the government’s supplies. In the final analysis, it is probably true that even an Attorney General who might zealously desire to enforce the criminal provisions of the Sherman Act would not likely be stimulated to institute civil proceedings for damages unless his attention was directed to the point by keenly alert and diligent purchasing agencies. To attempt to construe the Sherman Act by a vain effort to appraise the reasons responsible for the non-action of Attorneys General is a journey into the realm of imponderables I find it unnecessary to take. I would simply read the Act from its language and manifest purpose as giving all purchasers pf goods a right to sue if they have been injured as the result of prices held up by those types of unlawful combination condemned by the Act.4
The principle of strict construction now adopted in this case, resulting as it does in denying to the government the benefit of § 7 of the Sherman Act, is a radical departure from a long established policy under which the courts have construed laws most liberally in order to de*619clare the government entitled to their benefits.5 And certainly it can hardly be denied that the language of the Act, giving all persons a right of action, should if liberally construed be held to justify suit by the United States. For in Cotton v. United States, 11 How. 229, 231, decided forty years before the Sherman Act was adopted, this Court said in speaking of the United States: “Every sovereign State is of necessity a body politic, or artificial person, and as such capable of making contracts and holding property. ... It would present a strange anomaly, indeed, if, having the power to make contracts and hold property as other persons, natural or artificial, they were not entitled to the same remedies for their protection.” And, speaking in similar vein in Helvering v. Stockholms Enskilda Bank, 293 U. S. 84, 92, after having cited Blackstone for the proposition that the sovereign is a “corporation,” and after having gone even beyond this to hold that the statutory word “resident” included the United States, the Court said: “This may be in the nature of a legal fiction; but legal fictions have an appropriate place in the adminis*620tration of the law when they are required by the demands of convenience and justice.” 6
These particular cases are but facets of a general rule that has long been accepted — the United States can exercise all of the legal remedies which other persons, bodies or associations can exercise, both at common law and under statutes,* *****7 unless there is something in a statute or in its history to indicate an intent to deprive the United States of that right.8 In this case, nothing in the Sherman Act itself and nothing in its legislative history makes necessary the conclusion that Congress intended to withhold from the United States a remedy given to all other purchasers.9 Under these circumstances, it is my opinion that the judgment below should be reversed.
Mr. Justice Reed and Mr. Justice Douglas join in this dissent.

 A 1940 report to the Senate, made by the Secretary of the Treasury pursuant to a Senate Resolution, revealed that the federal government was transacting part of its business through the medium of at least 1469 government corporations. Senate Document No. 172, 76th Cong., 3rd Sess., Part 1, p. 4. The judgment here does not foreclose such corporations from suing for damages under § 7, or so I assume. If I am correct in my assumption, the result is that as to those purchases made by its corporate agencies, the Government is protected by the Sherman Act, while as to those purchases made by its non-corporate agencies, it is not so protected. A process of statutory construction which results in giving to government corporations a right denied to constitutionally authorized government departments seems to me to conflict with the frequently declared rule that a statute should not be interpreted in such way as to produce an unreasonable or unjust result. See United States v. American Trucking Associations, 310 U. S. 534, 542-543; Sorrells v. United States, 287 U. S. 435, 446.

 For a recent study, see “Government Purchasing — An Economic Commentary,” Monograph No. 19 of the Temporary National Economic' Committee (1940).

 An argument is offered to the effect that the government has no need of a right to damages, because it has the power to bring criminal and injunctive proceedings. But the right to bring those proceedings is given to’the government for the protection of the public, rather than for its self-protection as a purchaser. Further, criminal and injunctive proceedings, whatever their efficacy, do not achieve the object of § 7, which is to indemnify all injured purchasers.

 Though the Act is all-inclusive in naming those who may sue for damages, it is not equally all-inclusive in describing those acts which may be regarded as unlawful combinations. This is true both because of the original language and objects of the Sherman Act itself, and because of subsequent legislation. The most notable example of such subsequent legislation is that portion of the Clayton Act which provides: “The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce. Nothing contained in the antitrust laws shall be construed to forbid the existence and operation of labor, agricultural, or horticultural organizations ... or to forbid or restrain individual members of such organizations from lawfully carrying out the legitimate objects thereof; nor shall such organizations, or the members thereof, be held or construed to be illegal combinations or conspiracies in restraint of trade, under the antitrust -laws.” 38 Stat. 731, 15 U. S. C. § 17. See Apex Hosiery Co. v. Leader, 310 U. S. 469.

 It is argued that if the government can sue for damages it may also be sued for damages. That question is not before us and need not be decided. Other principles will be material if such a question ever should be presented. See United States v. Sherwood, ante, p. 584; Nardone v. United States, 302 U. S. 379, 383-384; United States v. Knight, 14 Pet. 301, 315. Among these principles the most important is that of sovereign immunity. “The sovereignty of the United States raises a presumption against its suability, unless it is clearly shown; nor should a court enlarge its liability to suit beyond what the language [of the statute in question] requires.” Eastern Transportation Co. v. United States, 272 U. S. 675, 686; Price v. United States, 174 U. S. 373, 375-376; United States v. Sherwood, ante, 584.

 To this statement the Court added: “If to carry out the purposes of a statute it be admissible to construe the word 'person’ as including the United States [cases to that effect having previously been cited], it is hard to see why, in like circumstances, it is inadmissible to construe the word 'resident’ as likewise including the United States.” Cf. Ohio v. Helvering, 292 U. S. 360, 370-71; Stanley v. Schwalby, 147 U. S. 508, 517.

 See Dugan v. United States, 3 Wheat. 172; United States v. Gear, 3 How. 120; Cotton v. United States, supra. Cf. Dollar Savings Bank v. United States, 19 Wall. 227; United States v. Chamberlin, 219 U. S. 250.

 Cf. Davis v. Pringle, 268 U. S. 315.

 The legislative history of the Sherman Act is not enlightening on the question now before us. At best, all that can be said of the very few and scattered statements that were made on the subject during the debates on the Clayton Act is that they look both ways.