Court Opinion

ID: 9418603
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:33:31.043577+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:06.858378
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice Stone,
dissenting.
I am unable to agree that the Federal Trade Commission, in the performance of its duties under the' Federal Trade Commission Act, lacks the power to-order the divestment of physical property, or that the decision in Federal Trade Commission v. Western Meat Company, 272 U. S. 554, forecloses our consideration of that question here. In the Thatcher and Swift cases considered in that opinion, the stock of competing corporations had been acquired in violation of § 7 of the Clayton Act, which prohibits the acquisition by one corporation of the capital stock of another “ where the effect of such acquisition may be to substantially lessen competition.” The stock control having been followed by purchase of the physical assets of the competing corporations, the Commission, proceeding under §§ 7 and 11, ordered the offending corporations to divest themselves of both the stock and the physical property. In deciding that the Commission had exceeded its authority, so far as the property was concerned, the Court expressly limited its consideration to the grant of power under §§ 7 and 11 of the Clayton Act, § 11 in terms authorizing the Commission to make an order “ requiring such person to cease and desist from such. violations; and divert itself of the stock held . . . contrary to the provisions of section 7 . . .” *626The effect of § 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, dealing with the different subject of únfair competition, was put to one side, the Court saying: “This section (referring to § 5) is not presently important; the challenged orders sought to enforce obedience to § 7 of the Clayton Act.” (p. 557.) The scope of the decision was thus stated: “When the Commission institutes, a proceeding based upon the holding of stock contrary to § 7 of the Clayton Act, its power is limited by § 11 to an order requiring the guilty person to cease and desist from such violation, effectually to divest itself of the stock, and to make no further use of it.” (p. 561.)
It was not held that thé Commission under no circumstances could compel the sale of physical property, and there was in fact a clear intimation in the opinion that under §'7 of the Clayton Act the acquisition of the property after a complaint had been -filed against the corporation for illegal' stock purchases would not find the Commission powerless.
Section 5 of the Trade Commission Act, with which we are now concerned, declares unlawful “ unfair meth-. ods of competition in commerce,” and empowers and directs the Commission to prevent the use of such methods. The Commission is directed upon finding that the method of. competition under investigation 's prohibited by the Act, to issue its order “ requiring such person, partnership or corporation to cease and desist from using such method of competition.”
The powers thus broadly given sharply contrast with the specific enumeration of §§ 7 and 11 of the Clayton Act; As was pointed out in the Western Meat Co. case, the Clayton Act prohibits only the acquisition of stock and not the assets of the competing corporation, and in terms merely authorizes an order requiring the corporation “ to cease and desist from such violations, and divest itself of the stock held. . . For that reason alone, *627the majority of the Court thought that the language of these provisions was not broad enoúgh to enable the Commission to order the corporation to divest itself of the physical assets thus acquired, although their acquisition aggravated and brought to its final consummation the very evil aimed at by the statute.
The comprehensive language of § 5 neither invites nor supports a narrow construction. It is general in terms, and in the authorized prevention of unfair methods of competition the Commission is not limited to any particular method of making its orders effective. The power does not any the less exist because the Commission framed the present order in part in affirmative terms specifying the manner in, which the company should abandon the unfair method of competition it found had been practiced. Nor does the fact that the Commission is not a court of equity lessen the power conferred upon it by the statute. It is of course essentially an. administrative agency. Its orders never have the effect of an injunction and are enforeible only by proceedings instituted in the appropriate circuit court of appeals. Its powers are not enhanced by. the circumstance that its orders are enforeible in courts having in their own right equity powers. But it' isjikewise true that it cannot be denied powers granted by Congress merely because its orders resemble in form familiar equitable decrees. To make its want of equity powers ground for limiting those expressly, conferred by the statute is to-condemn all the orders ever made by the Commission. - Orders compelling the-sale of stock, preventing price cutting, local price discrimination, resale' price maintenance,- exclusive dealing arrangements, boycotting, blacklisting^disparagement of competitor’s wares, misrepresentation, misbranding, adulteration, dishonest advertising, espionage, -.commercial bribery, coercion, threats, intimidation, the use of “fighting brands” or bogus independents, to mention *628only a few of the practices which the Commission has forbidden, remind of equitable relief no less than an order compelling the sale of physical property, the very acquisition and continued possession of which may be the indispensable element in a scheme of unfair competition.
The conclusion seems to me unavoidable, therefore, that this case cannot be disposed of without determining whether the acquisition and retention of the film laboratories by the Eastman Company, under the circumstances disclosed by the record, constituted in itself or was a part of or a step in an unfair method of competition. Until that is determined we cannot say that the Commission was without power under § 5 to make any appropriate order to prevent the use of such methods.
That ruinous competition, or the threat of it, when the aim is monopoly or the suppression of competition, may be the dominant factor in a violation of the Sherman Act is no longer fairly open to question. But, in determining the meaning of “unfair methods of competition,” it should be borne in mind that the Trade Commission’s function is to discourage certain trade tendencies before violations of the Sherman Act have occurred. The advised use of the phrase “ unfair methods of competition ” for the more familiar “ unfair competition ” of the common law indicates an unmistakable Congressional intent to confer on the Commission the power, subject of course to the judicial review provided for in the Act, to prevent unfair trade practices not included in the prohibition of the Sherman Act and of the common law. See Henderson, Federal Trade Commission, 36; cf. Federal Trade Commission v. Winsted Hosiery Co., 258 U. S. 483.
In that part of its order which now remains undisturbed, and which is not questioned here, the Commission has found and forbidden the agreement between the Eastman Company and the Association that the members of the Association would use American raw film, of which *629it appears ninety-four per cent, of that used in the United States is produced by the Eastman Company, to the exclusion of foreign-manufactured film, proyided the Eastman "Company would not operate its laboratories .commercially to produce positive prints in competition with: the members of the Association. •
The majority, not having found it necessary to consider whether the stipulated facts established unfair methods of competition because of the Commission’s supposed want of power, any extended review of them here is uncalled for. But the evidence is sufficient to justify the inference drawn by the Commission that suppression of. competition in the sale of foreign films, consummated by this agreement, was accomplished in part at least by the acquisition and retention of these laboratories as. a constant and imminent threat to members of the Association of competition in the business field they occupy.
Superficial examination might suggest that the respondent’s course of conduct involves nothing more than the innocuous process of extending its business- to-include an allied trade, but the matter may not be thus lightly disposed of. We may lay aside the question whether one already possessing monopoly powers in one field, especially where as here there is no available substitute for his products, may make use of his strategic position to dominate all phases of the industry from production to consumption. For here it seems fairly inferable from the stipulated facts that there was no intention, of permanent expansion. The Eastman Company threatened to engage in temporary competition with the manufacturers of prints in order to attain its objective — the suppression of foreign competition in raw film. When that was attained, the laboratories were allowed to remain idle, and the assumed advantages to the public from permanent competition were lacking. .1 have no difficulty in concluding that this threat of. temporary competition was unfair to the Eastman Company’s purchasers and to its *630foreign competitors, and was an unfair method of competition within the meaning of § 5. Compare Tuttle v. Buck, 107 Minn. 145; Dunshee v. Standard Oil Co., 152 Ia. 618, 626-627; United States v. Corn Products Refining Co., 234 Fed. 964, 984, 1010; United States v. Central West Publishing Co., Decrees and Judgments in Federal Anti-Trust Cases, 359, 360, 362; Thomsen v. Cayser, 243 U. S. 66, 87; for cases which, although not exactly in point, lend support to this view.
It would seem that that part of the order which still stands, forbidding the agreement for the suppression of competition, is futile if the Eastman Company may retain the laboratories as a threat to compel the manufacturers of prints to do that which they could not lawfully agree to do. In my view, the decree below should be reversed and the order of the Commission upheld.
Me. Justice Brandéis joins in this dissent.