Court Opinion

ID: 9423593
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:08:23.122841+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:44.977542
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Douglas,
dissenting.
I agree with The Chief Justice that this is an important case which warrants the attention of the Court. It puts into focus several important issues, among them an aspect of the modern corporation which has become vital in the Federal Government’s procurement program. Professor Galbraith has referred to it in his recent book The New Industrial State:
“Increasingly it will be recognized that the mature corporation, as it develops, becomes part of the larger administrative complex associated with the state. In time the line between the two will disappear. Men will look back in amusement at the pretense that once caused people to refer to General Dynamics and North American Aviation and A. T. & T. as private business.
“Though this recognition will not be universally welcomed, it will be healthy. There is always a presumption in social matters in favor of reality as opposed to myth. The autonomy of the techno-structure is, to repeat yet again, a functional necessity of the industrial system. But the goals this autonomy serves allow some range of choice. If the mature corporation is recognized to be part of the penumbra of the state, it will be more strongly in the service of social goals. It cannot plead its inherently private character or its subordination to the market as cover for the pursuit of different goals of particular interest to itself. The public agency has an unquestioned tendency to pursue goals that reflect its own interest and convenience and to adapt social objective thereto. But it cannot plead this as a superior right. There may well be danger in *985this association of public and economic power. But it is less if it is recognized.” Id., at 393-394.
I think the time has come for us to explore this problem; and the setting of the present case shows how pressing the problem is.