U.S. Supreme Court Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v.
United States, 221 U.S. 1 (1910) Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v.
United States Argued March 14, 15, 16,
1910 Restored to docket for reargument
April 11, 1910 Reargued January 12, 13, 16, 17,
1911 Decided May 15, 1911 221 U.S.
1 APPEAL FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF
THE UNITED STATES FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF
MISSOURI Syllabus The Anti-Trust Act of July 2, 1890, c. 647, 26 Stat. 209, should
be construed in the light of reason; and, as so construed, it
prohibits all contracts and combination which amount to an
unreasonable or undue restraint of trade in interstate
commerce.

															The combination of the defendants in this case is an
unreasonable and undue restraint of trade in petroleum and its
products moving in interstate commerce, and falls within the
prohibitions of the act as so construed.

															Where one of the defendants in a suit, brought by the Government
in a Circuit Court of the United States under the authority of § 4
of the Anti-Trust Act of July 2, 1890, is within the district, the
court, under the authority of § 5 of that act, can take
jurisdiction and order notice to be served upon the nonresident
defendants.

															Allegations as to facts occurring prior to the passage of the
Anti-Trust Act may be considered solely to throw light on acts done
after the passage of the act. Page 221 U. S. 2 The debates in Congress on the Anti-Trust Act of 1890 show that
one of the influences leading to the enactment of the statute was
doubt as to whether there is a common law of the United States
governing the making of contracts in restraint of trade and the
creation and maintenance of monopolies in the absence of
legislation.

															While debates of the body enacting it may not be used as means
for interpreting a statute, they may be resorted to as a means of
ascertaining the conditions under which it was enacted.

															The terms "restraint of trade," and "attempts to monopolize," as
used in the Anti-Trust Act, took their origin in the common law,
and were familiar in the law of this country prior to and at the
time of the adoption of the act, and their meaning should be sought
from the conceptions of both English and American law prior to the
passage of the act.

															The original doctrine that all contracts in restraint of trade
were illegal was long since so modified in the interest of freedom
of individuals to contract that the contract was valid if the
resulting restraint was only partial in its operation, and was
otherwise reasonable.

															The early struggle in England against the power to create
monopolies resulted in establishing that those institutions were
incompatible with the English Constitution.

															At common law, monopolies were unlawful because of their
restriction upon individual freedom of contract and their injury to
the public and at common law, and contracts creating the same evils
were brought within the prohibition as impeding the due course of,
or being in restraint of, trade.

															At the time of the passage of the Anti-Trust Act, the English
rule was that the individual was free to contract and to abstain
from contracting and to exercise every reasonable right in regard
thereto, except only as he was restricted from voluntarily and
unreasonably or for wrongful purposes restraining his right to
carry on his trade. Mogul Steamship Co. v. McGregor, 1892,
A.C. 25.

															A decision of the House of Lords, although announced after an
event, may serve reflexly to show the state of the law in England
at the time of such event.

															This country has followed the line of development of the law of
England, and the public policy has been to prohibit, or treat as
illegal, contracts, or acts entered into with intent to wrong the
public and which unreasonably restrict competitive conditions,
limit the right of individuals, restrain the free flow of commerce,
or bring about public evils such as the enhancement of prices. Page 221 U. S. 3 The Anti-Trust Act of 1890 was enacted in the light of the then
existing practical conception of the law against restraint of
trade, and the intent of Congress was not to restrain the right to
make and enforce contracts, whether resulting from combinations or
otherwise, which do not unduly restrain interstate or foreign
commerce, but to protect that commerce from contracts or
combinations by methods, whether old or new, which would constitute
an interference with, or an undue restraint upon, it.

															The Anti-Trust Act contemplated and required a standard of
interpretation, and it was intended that the standard of reason
which had been applied at the common law should be applied in
determining whether particular acts were within its
prohibitions.

															The word "person" in § 2 of the Anti-Trust Act, as construed by
reference to § 8 thereof, implies a corporation as well as an
individual.

															The commerce referred to by the words "any part" in § 2 of the
Antitrust Act, as construed in the light of the manifest purpose of
that act, includes geographically any part of the United States and
also any of the classes of things forming a part of interstate or
foreign commerce.

															The words "to monopolize" and "monopolize" as used in § 2 of the
Anti-Trust Act reach every act bringing about the prohibited
result.

															Freedom to contract is the essence of freedom from undue
restraint on the right to contract.

															In prior cases where general language has been used, to the
effect that reason could not be resorted to in determining whether
a particular case was within the prohibitions of the Anti-Trust
Act, the unreasonableness of the acts under consideration was
pointed out, and those cases are only authoritative by the
certitude that the rule of reason was applied; United States v.
Trans-Missouri Freight Association, 166 U.
S. 290 , and United States v. Joint Traffic
Association, 171 U. S. 505 ,
limited and qualified so far as they conflict with the construction
now given to the Anti-Trust Act of 1890.

															The application of the Anti-Trust Act to combinations involving
the production of commodities within the States does not so extend
the power of Congress to subjects dehors its authority as
to render the statute unconstitutional. United States v. E. C.
Knight Co., 156 U. S. 1 ,
distinguished.

															The Anti-Trust Act generically enumerates the character of the
acts prohibited and the wrongs which it intends to prevent, and is
susceptible of being enforced without any judicial exertion of
legislative power.

															The unification of power and control over a commodity such as
petroleum Page 221 U. S. 4 and its products by combining in one corporation the stocks of
many other corporations aggregating a vast capital gives rise, of
itself, to the prima facie presumption of an intent and
purpose to dominate the industry connected with, and gain perpetual
control of the movement of, that commodity and its products in the
channels of interstate commerce in violation of the Anti-Trust Act
of 1890, and that presumption is made conclusive by proof of
specific acts such as those in the record of this case.

															The fact that a combination over the products of a commodity
such as petroleum does not include the crude article itself does
not take the combination outside of the Anti-Trust Act when it
appears that the monopolization of the manufactured products
necessarily controls the crude article.

															Penalties which are not authorized by the law cannot be
inflicted by judicial authority.

															The remedy to be administered in case of a combination violating
the Anti-Trust Act is two-fold: first, to forbid the continuance of
the prohibited act, and second, to so dissolve the combination as
to neutralize the force of the unlawful power.

															The constituents of an unlawful combination under the Anti-Trust
Act should not be deprived of power to make normal and lawful
contracts, but should be restrained from continuing or recreating
the unlawful combination by any means whatever, and a dissolution
of the offending combination should not deprive the constituents of
the right to live under the law, but should compel them to obey
it.

															In determining the remedy against an unlawful combination, the
court must consider the result, and not inflict serious injury on
the public by causing a cessation of interstate commerce in a
necessary commodity.

															173 Fed. Rep. 177, modified and affirmed.

															The facts, which involve the construction of the Sherman
Anti-Trust Act of July 2, 1890, and whether defendants had violated
its provisions, are stated in the opinion. Page 221 U. S. 30 MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WHITE delivered the opinion of the court.

															The Standard Oil Company of New Jersey and 33 other
corporations, John D. Rockefeller, William Rockefeller, and five
other individual defendants prosecute this appeal to reverse a
decree of the court below. Such decree was entered upon a bill
filed by the United States under authority of § 4 of the act of
July 2, 1890, c. 647, p. 209, known as the Anti-Trust Act, and had
for its object the enforcement of the provisions of that act. The
record is inordinately voluminous, consisting of twenty-three
volumes of printed matter, aggregating about twelve thousand pages,
containing a vast amount of confusing and conflicting testimony Page 221 U. S. 31 relating to innumerable, complex and varied business
transactions, extending over a period of nearly forty years. In an
effort to pave the way to reach the subjects which we are called
upon to consider, we propose at the outset, following the order of
the bill, to give the merest possible outline of its contents, to
summarize the answer, to indicate the course of the trial, and
point out briefly the decision below rendered.

															The bill and exhibits, covering one hundred and seventy pages of
the printed record, was filed on November 15, 1906. Corporations
known as Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, Standard Oil Company
of California, Standard Oil Company of Indiana, Standard Oil
Company of Iowa, Standard Oil Company of Kansas, Standard Oil
Company of Kentucky, Standard Oil Company of Nebraska, Standard Oil
Company of New York, Standard Oil Company of Ohio, and sixty-two
other corporations and partnerships, as also seven individuals were
named as defendants. The bill was divided into thirty numbered
sections, and sought relief upon the theory that the various
defendants were engaged in conspiring

															"to restrain the trade and commerce in petroleum, commonly
called 'crude oil,' in refined oil, and in the other products of
petroleum, among the several States and Territories of the United
States and the District of Columbia and with foreign nations, and
to monopolize the said commerce."

															The conspiracy was alleged to have been formed in or about the
year 1870 by three of the individual defendants, viz: John
D. Rockefeller, William Rockefeller, and Henry M. Flagler. The
detailed averments concerning the alleged conspiracy were arranged
with reference to three periods, the first from 1870 to 1882, the
second from 1882 to 1899, and the third from 1899 to the time of
the filing of the bill.

															The general charge concerning the period from 1870 to 1882 was
as follows: Page 221 U. S. 32 "That during said first period, the said individual defendants,
in connection with the Standard Oil Company of Ohio, purchased and
obtained interests through stock ownership and otherwise in, and
entered into agreements with, various persons, firms, corporations,
and limited partnerships engaged in purchasing, shipping, refining,
and selling petroleum and its products among the various States for
the purpose of fixing the price of crude and refined oil and the
products thereof, limiting the production thereof, and controlling
the transportation therein, and thereby restraining trade and
commerce among the several States, and monopolizing the said
commerce."

															To establish this charge, it was averred that John D. and
William Rockefeller and several other named individuals, who, prior
to 1870, composed three separate partnerships engaged in the
business of refining crude oil and shipping its products in
interstate commerce, organized in the year 1870 a corporation known
as the Standard Oil Company of Ohio and transferred to that company
the business of the said partnerships, the members thereof
becoming, in proportion to their prior ownership, stockholders in
the corporation. It was averred that the other individual
defendants soon afterwards became participants in the illegal
combination and either transferred property to the corporation or
to individuals to be held for the benefit of all parties in
interest in proportion to their respective interests in the
combination; that is, in proportion to their stock ownership in the
Standard Oil Company of Ohio. By the means thus stated, it was
charged that, by the year 1872, the combination had acquired
substantially all but three or four of the thirty-five or forty oil
refineries located in Cleveland, Ohio. By reason of the power thus
obtained and in further execution of the intent and purpose to
restrain trade and to monopolize the commerce, interstate as well
as intrastate, in petroleum and its products, the bill alleged that
the combination and its members Page 221 U. S. 33 obtained large preferential rates and rebates in many and
devious ways over their competitors from various railroad
companies, and that, by means of the advantage thus obtained, many,
if not virtually all, competitors were forced either to become
members of the combination or were driven out of business, and
thus, it was alleged, during the period in question, the following
results were brought about: a. that the combination, in addition to
the refineries in Cleveland which it had acquired as previously
stated, and which it had either dismantled to limit production or
continued to operate, also from time to time acquired a large
number of refineries of crude petroleum, situated in New York,
Pennsylvania, Ohio and elsewhere. The properties thus acquired,
like those previously obtained, although belonging to and being
held for the benefit of the combination, were ostensibly
divergently controlled, some of them being put in the name of the
Standard Oil Company of Ohio, some in the name of corporations or
limited partnerships affiliated therewith, or some being left in
the name of the original owners, who had become stockholders in the
Standard Oil Company of Ohio, and thus members of the alleged
illegal combination. b. That the combination had obtained control
of the pipelines available for transporting oil from the oil fields
to the refineries in Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Titusville,
Philadelphia, New York and New Jersey. c. That the combination
during the period named had obtained a complete mastery over the
oil industry, controlling 90 percent of the business of producing,
shipping, refining and selling petroleum and its products, and thus
was able to fix the price of crude and refined petroleum and to
restrain and monopolize all interstate commerce in those
products.

															The averments bearing upon the second period (1882 to 1899) had
relation to the claim:

															"That, during the said second period of conspiracy, the
defendants entered into a contract and trust agreement Page 221 U. S. 34 by which various independent firms, corporations, limited
partnerships and individuals engaged in purchasing, transporting,
refining, shipping and selling oil and the products thereof among
the various States turned over the management of their said
business, corporations and limited partnerships to nine trustees,
composed chiefly of certain individuals defendant herein, which
said trust agreement was in restraint of trade and commerce and in
violation of law, as hereinafter more particularly alleged."

															The trust agreement thus referred to was set out in the bill. It
was made in January, 1882. By its terms, the stock of forty
corporations, including the Standard Oil Company of Ohio, and a
large quantity of various properties which had been previously
acquired by the alleged combination and which was held in diverse
forms, as we have previously indicated, for the benefit of the
members of the combination, was vested in the trustees and their
successors, "to be held for all parties in interest jointly." In
the body of the trust agreement was contained a list of the various
individuals and corporations and limited partnerships whose
stockholders and members, or a portion thereof, became parties to
the agreement. This list is in the margin. [ Footnote 1 ] Page 221 U. S. 35 The agreement made provision for the method of controlling and
managing the property by the trustees, for the formation of
additional manufacturing, etc., corporations Page 221 U. S. 36 in various States, and the trust, unless terminated by a mode
specified, was to continue "during the lives of the survivors and
survivor of the trustees named in the agreement and for twenty-one
years thereafter." The agreement provided for the issue of Standard
Oil Trust certificates to represent the interest arising under the
trust in the properties affected by the trust, which, of course, in
view of the provisions of the agreement and the subject to which it
related, caused the interest in the certificates to be coincident
with and the exact representative of the interest in the
combination, that is, in the Standard Oil Company of Ohio. Soon
afterwards, it was alleged, the trustees organized the Standard Oil
Company of New Jersey and the Standard Oil Company of New York, the
former having a capital stock of $3,000,000 and the latter a
capital stock of $5,000,000, subsequently increased to $10,000,000
and $15,000,000, respectively. The bill alleged

															"that, pursuant to said trust agreement, the said trustees
caused to be transferred to themselves the stocks of all
corporations and limited partnerships named in said trust
agreement, and caused various of the individuals and
copartnerships, who owned apparently independent refineries and
other properties employed in the business of refining and
transporting and selling oil in and among said various States and
Territories Page 221 U. S. 37 of the United States as aforesaid, to transfer their property
situated in said several States to the respective Standard Oil
Companies of said States of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and
Ohio, and other corporations organized or acquired by said trustees
from time to time. . . ."

															For the stocks and property so acquired, the trustees issued
trust certificates. It was alleged that, in 1888, the trustees

															"unlawfully controlled the stock and ownership of various
corporations and limited partnerships engaged in such purchase and
transportation, refining, selling, and shipping of oil,"

															as per a list which is excerpted in the margin. [ Footnote 2 ] Page 221 U. S. 38 The bill charged that, during the second period, quo
warranto proceedings were commenced against the Standard Oil
Company of Ohio, which resulted in the entry by the Supreme Court
of Ohio, on March 2, 1892, of a decree Page 221 U. S. 39 adjudging the trust agreement to be void, not only because the
Standard Oil Company of Ohio was a party to the same, but also
because the agreement, in and of itself, Page 221 U. S. 40 was in restraint of trade and amounted to the creation of an
unlawful monopoly. It was alleged that shortly after this decision,
seemingly for the purpose of complying therewith, voluntary
proceedings were had apparently to dissolve the trust, but that
these proceedings were a subterfuge and a sham, because they simply
amounted to a transfer of the stock held by the trust in 64 of the
companies which it controlled to some of the remaining 20
companies, it having controlled before the decree 84 in all,
thereby, while seemingly in part giving up its dominion, yet in
reality preserving the same by means of the control of the
companies as to which it had retained complete authority. It was
charged that especially was this the case as the stock in the
companies selected for transfer was virtually owned by the nine
trustees or the members of their immediate families or associates.
The bill further alleged that, in 1897, the Attorney-General of
Ohio instituted contempt proceedings in the quo warranto case based upon the claim that the trust had not been dissolved as
required by the decree in that case. About the same time also,
proceedings in quo warranto were commenced to forfeit the
charter of a pipeline known as the Buckeye Pipe Line Company,
an Page 221 U. S. 41 Ohio corporation, whose stock, it was alleged, was owned by the
members of the combination, on the ground of its connection with
the trust which had been held to be illegal.

															The result of these proceedings, the bill charged, caused a
resort to the alleged wrongful acts asserted to have been committed
during the third period, as follows:

															"That during the third period of said conspiracy and in
pursuance thereof, the said individual defendants operated through
the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, as a holding corporation,
which corporation obtained and acquired the majority of the stocks
of the various corporations engaged in purchasing, transporting,
refining, shipping, and selling oil into and among the various
States and Territories of the United States and the District of
Columbia and with foreign nations, and thereby managed and
controlled the same, in violation of the laws of the United States,
as hereinafter more particularly alleged."

															It was alleged that, in or about the month of January, 1899, the
individual defendants caused the charter of the Standard Oil
Company of New Jersey to be amended

															"so that the business and objects of said company were stated as
follows, to-wit: 'To do all kinds of mining, manufacturing, and
trading business; transporting goods and merchandise by land or
water in any manner; to buy, sell, lease, and improve land; build
houses, structures, vessels, cars, wharves, docks, and piers; to
lay and operate pipelines; to erect lines for conducting
electricity; to enter into and carry out contracts of every kind
pertaining to its business; to acquire, use, sell, and grant
licenses under patent rights; to purchase or otherwise acquire,
hold, sell, assign, and transfer shares of capital stock and bonds
or other evidences of indebtedness of corporations, and to exercise
all the privileges of ownership, including voting upon the stock so
held; to carry on its business and have offices and agencies
therefor in all parts of the world, and Page 221 U. S. 42 to hold, purchase, mortgage, and convey real estate and personal
property outside the State of New Jersey.'"

															The capital stock of the company -- which, since March 19, 1892,
had been $10,000,000 -- was increased to $110,000,000, and the
individual defendants, as theretofore, continued to be a majority
of the board of directors.

															Without going into detail, it suffices to say that it was
alleged in the bill that, shortly after these proceedings, the
trust came to an end, the stock of the various corporations which
had been controlled by it being transferred by its holders to the
Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, which corporation issued
therefor certificates of its common stock to the amount of
$97,250,000. The bill contained allegations referring to the
development of new oil fields, for example, in California,
southeastern Kansas, northern Indian Territory, and northern
Oklahoma, and made reference to the building or otherwise acquiring
by the combination of refineries and pipelines in the new fields
for the purpose of restraining and monopolizing the interstate
trade in petroleum and its products.

															Reiterating in substance the averments that both the Standard
Oil Trust from 1882 to 1899 and the Standard Oil Company of New
Jersey since 1899 had monopolized and restrained interstate
commerce in petroleum and its products, the bill at great length
additionally set forth various means by which, during the second
and third periods, in addition to the effect occasioned by the
combination of alleged previously independent concerns, the
monopoly and restraint complained of was continued. Without
attempting to follow the elaborate averments on these subjects
spread over fifty-seven pages of the printed record, it suffices to
say that such averments may properly be grouped under the following
heads: rebates, preferences and other discriminatory practises in
favor of the combination by railroad companies; restraint and
monopolization by control of pipelines, and unfair practises
against competing Page 221 U. S. 43 pipelines; contracts with competitors in restraint of trade;
unfair methods of competition, such as local price-cutting at the
points where necessary to suppress competition; espionage of the
business of competitors, the operation of bogus independent
companies, and payment of rebates on oil, with the like intent; the
division of the United States into districts and the limiting of
the operations of the various subsidiary corporations as to such
districts so that competition in the sale of petroleum products
between such corporations had been entirely eliminated and
destroyed, and, finally, reference was made to what was alleged to
be the "enormous and unreasonable profits" earned by the Standard
Oil Trust and the Standard Oil Company as a result of the alleged
monopoly, which presumably was averred as a means of reflexly
inferring the scope and power acquired by the alleged
combination.

															Coming to the prayer of the bill, it suffices to say that, in
general terms, the substantial relief asked was, first, that the
combination in restraint of interstate trade and commerce and which
had monopolized the same, as alleged in the bill, be found to have
existence, and that the parties thereto be perpetually enjoined
from doing any further act to give effect to it; second, that the
transfer of the stocks of the various corporations to the Standard
Oil Company of New Jersey, as alleged in the bill, be held to be in
violation of the first and second sections of the Antitrust Act,
and that the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey be enjoined and
restrained from in any manner continuing to exert control over the
subsidiary corporations by means of ownership of said stock or
otherwise; third, that specific relief by injunction be awarded
against further violation of the statute by any of the acts
specifically complained of in the bill. There was also a prayer for
general relief.

															Of the numerous defendants named in the bill, the Waters-Pierce
Oil Company was the only resident of the Page 221 U. S. 44 district in which the suit was commenced and the only defendant
served with process therein. Contemporaneous with the filing of the
bill, the court made an order, under § 5 of the Anti-Trust Act, for
the service of process upon all the other defendants, wherever they
could be found. Thereafter, the various defendants unsuccessfully
moved to vacate the order for service on nonresident defendants or
filed pleas to the jurisdiction. Joint exceptions were likewise
unsuccessfully filed, upon the ground of impertinence, to many of
the averments of the bill of complaint, particularly those which
related to acts alleged to have been done by the combination prior
to the passage of the Anti-Trust Act and prior to the year
1899.

															Certain of the defendants filed separate answers, and a joint
answer was filed on behalf of the Standard Oil Company of New
Jersey and numerous of the other defendants. The scope of the
answers will be adequately indicated by quoting a summary on the
subject made in the brief for the appellants.

															"It is sufficient to say that, whilst admitting many of the
alleged acquisitions of property, the formation of the so-called
trust of 1882, its dissolution in 1892, and the acquisition by the
Standard Oil Company of New Jersey of the stocks of the various
corporations in 1899, they deny all the allegations respecting
combinations or conspiracies to restrain or monopolize the oil
trade, and particularly that the so-called trust of 1882, or the
acquisition of the shares of the defendant companies by the
Standard Oil Company of New Jersey in 1899, was a combination of
independent or competing concerns or corporations. The averments of
the petition respecting the means adopted to monopolize the oil
trade are traversed either by a denial of the acts alleged or of
their purpose, intent or effect."

															On June 24, 1907, the cause being at issue, a special examiner
was appointed to take the evidence, and his report was filed March
22, 1909. It was heard on April 5 Page 221 U. S. 45 to 10, 1909, under the expediting act of February 11, 1903,
before a Circuit Court consisting of four judges.

															The court decided in favor of the United States. In the opinion
delivered, all the multitude of acts of wrongdoing charged in the
bill were put aside, insofar as they were alleged to have been
committed prior to the passage of the Anti-Trust Act, "except as
evidence of their (the defendants') purpose, of their continuing
conduct and of its effect." (173 Fed.Rep. 177.)

															By the decree which was entered, it was adjudged that the
combining of the stocks of various companies in the hands of the
Standard Oil Company of New Jersey in 1899 constituted a
combination in restraint of trade and also an attempt to monopolize
and a monopolization under § 2 of the Anti-Trust Act. The decree
was against seven individual defendants, the Standard Oil Company
of New Jersey, thirty-six domestic companies, and one foreign
company which the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey controls by
stock ownership; these 38 corporate defendants being held to be
parties to the combination found to exist. [ Footnote 3 ]

															The bill was dismissed as to all other corporate defendants, 33
in number, it being adjudged by § 3 of the decree that they "have
not been proved to be engaged in the operation or carrying out of
the combination." [ Footnote
4 ] Page 221 U. S. 46 The Standard Oil Company of New Jersey was enjoined from voting
the stocks or exerting any control over the said 37 subsidiary
companies, and the subsidiary companies were enjoined from paying
any dividends as to the Standard Oil Company or permitting it to
exercise any control over them by virtue of the stock ownership or
power acquired by means of the combination. The individuals and
corporations were also enjoined from entering into or carrying into
effect any like combination which would evade the decree. Further,
the individual defendants, the Standard Oil Company, and the 37
subsidiary corporations were enjoined from engaging or continuing
in interstate commerce in petroleum or its products during the
continuance of the illegal combination.

															At the outset a question of jurisdiction requires consideration,
and we shall, also, as a preliminary, dispose of another question,
to the end that our attention may be completely concentrated upon
the merits of the controversy when we come to consider them.

															First. We are of opinion that, in consequence of the presence
within the district of the Waters-Pierce Oil Company, the court,
under the authority of § 5 of the Anti-Trust Act, rightly took
jurisdiction over the cause and properly ordered notice to be
served upon the nonresident defendants.

															Second. The overruling of the exceptions taken to so much of the
bill as counted upon facts occurring prior to the passage of the
Anti-Trust Act -- whatever may be the view as an original question
of the duty to restrict the controversy to a much narrower area
than that propounded by the bill -- we think by no possibility in
the present stage of the case can the action of the court be
treated as prejudicial error justifying reversal. We say this
because the court, as we shall do, gave no weight to the testimony
adduced under the averments complained of except insofar as it
tended to throw light upon the acts done after the Page 221 U. S. 47 passage of the Anti-Trust Act and the results of which it was
charged were being participated in and enjoyed by the alleged
combination at the time of the filing of the bill.

															We are thus brought face to face with the merits of the
controversy.

															Both as to the law and as to the facts, the opposing contentions
pressed in the argument are numerous, and, in all their aspects,
are so irreconcilable that it is difficult to reduce them to some
fundamental generalization which, by being disposed of, would
decide them all. For instance, as to the law. While both sides
agree that the determination of the controversy rests upon the
correct construction and application of the first and second
sections of the Anti-Trust Act, yet the views as to the meaning of
the act are as wide apart as the poles, since there is no real
point of agreement on any view of the act. And this also is the
case as to the scope and effect of authorities relied upon, even
although, in some instances, one and the same authority is asserted
to be controlling.

															So also is it as to the facts. Thus, on the one hand, with
relentless pertinacity and minuteness of analysis, it is insisted
that the facts establish that the assailed combination took its
birth in a purpose to unlawfully acquire wealth by oppressing the
public and destroying the just rights of others, and that its
entire career exemplifies an inexorable carrying out of such
wrongful intents, since, it is asserted, the pathway of the
combination, from the beginning to the time of the filing of the
bill, is marked with constant proofs of wrong inflicted upon the
public, and is strewn with the wrecks resulting from crushing out,
without regard to law, the individual rights of others. Indeed, so
conclusive, it is urged, is the proof on these subjects that it is
asserted that the existence of the principal corporate defendant --
the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey -- with the vast
accumulation of property which it owns or controls, because of its
infinite potency Page 221 U. S. 48 for harm and the dangerous example which its continued existence
affords, is an open and enduring menace to all freedom of trade,
and is a byword and reproach to modern economic methods. On the
other hand, in a powerful analysis of the facts, it is insisted
that they demonstrate that the origin and development of the vast
business which the defendants control was but the result of lawful
competitive methods, guided by economic genius of the highest
order, sustained by courage, by a keen insight into commercial
situations, resulting in the acquisition of great wealth, but at
the same time serving to stimulate and increase production, to
widely extend the distribution of the products of petroleum at a
cost largely below that which would have otherwise prevailed, thus
proving to be, at one and the same time, a benefaction to the
general public as well as of enormous advantage to individuals. It
is not denied that, in the enormous volume of proof contained in
the record in the period of almost a lifetime to which that proof
is addressed, there may be found acts of wrongdoing, but the
insistence is that they were rather the exception than the rule,
and, in most cases, were either the result of too great individual
zeal in the keen rivalries of business or of the methods and habits
of dealing which, even if wrong, were commonly practised at the
time. And, to discover and state the truth concerning these
contentions, both arguments call for the analysis and weighing, as
we have said at the outset, of a jungle of conflicting testimony
covering a period of forty years, a duty difficult to rightly
perform and, even if satisfactorily accomplished, almost impossible
to state with any reasonable regard to brevity.

															Duly appreciating the situation just stated, it is certain that
only one point of concord between the parties is discernable, which
is that the controversy in every aspect is controlled by a correct
conception of the meaning of the first and second sections of the
Anti-Trust Act. We shall Page 221 U. S. 49 therefore -- departing from what otherwise would be the natural
order of analysis -- make this one point of harmony the initial
basis of our examination of the contentions, relying upon the
conception that, by doing so, some harmonious resonance may result
adequate to dominate and control the discord with which the case
abounds. That is to say, we shall first come to consider the
meaning of the first and second sections of the Anti-Trust Act by
the text, and, after discerning what by that process appears to be
its true meaning, we shall proceed to consider the respective
contentions of the parties concerning the act, the strength or
weakness of those contentions, as well as the accuracy of the
meaning of the act as deduced from the text in the light of the
prior decisions of this court concerning it. When we have done
this, we shall then approach the facts. Following this course, we
shall make our investigation under four separate headings: First.
The text of the first and second sections of the act originally
considered, and its meaning in the light of the common law and the
law of this country at the time of its adoption. Second. The
contentions of the parties concerning the act, and the scope and
effect of the decisions of this court upon which they rely. Third.
The application of the statute to facts, and, Fourth. The remedy,
if any, to be afforded as the result of such application. First. The text of the act and its meaning. We quote the text of the first and second sections of the act,
as follows:

															"SECTION 1. Every contract, combination in the form of trust or
otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce, among
the several States, or with foreign nations, is hereby declared to
be illegal. Every person who shall make any such contract, or
engage in any such combination or conspiracy, shall be deemed
guilty of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be
punished by fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, or by Page 221 U. S. 50 imprisonment not exceeding one year, or by both said
punishments, in the discretion of the court."

															"SEC. 2. Every person who shall monopolize, or attempt to
monopolize, or combine or conspire with any other person or
persons, to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the
several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed guilty of
a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by
fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not
exceeding one year, or by both said punishments, in the discretion
of the court."

															The debates show that doubt as to whether there was a common law
of the United States which governed the subject in the absence of
legislation was among the influences leading to the passage of the
act. They conclusively show, however, that the main cause which led
to the legislation was the thought that it was required by the
economic condition of the times, that is, the vast accumulation of
wealth in the hands of corporations and individuals, the enormous
development of corporate organization, the facility for combination
which such organizations afforded, the fact that the facility was
being used, and that combinations known as trusts were being
multiplied, and the widespread impression that their power had been
and would be exerted to oppress individuals and injure the public
generally. Although debates may not be used as a means for
interpreting a statute ( United States v. Trans-Missouri Freight
Association, 166 U. S. 318 ,
and cases cited) that rule, in the nature of things, is not
violated by resorting to debates as a means of ascertaining the
environment at the time of the enactment of a particular law, that
is, the history of the period when it was adopted.

															There can be no doubt that the sole subject with which the first
section deals is restraint of trade as therein contemplated, and
that the attempt to monopolize and monopolization is the subject
with which the second section Page 221 U. S. 51 is concerned. It is certain that those terms, at least in their
rudimentary meaning, took their origin in the common law, and were
also familiar in the law of this country prior to and at the time
of the adoption of the act in question.

															We shall endeavor then, first to seek their meaning not by
indulging in an elaborate and learned analysis of the English law
and of the law of this country, but by making a very brief
reference to the elementary and indisputable conceptions of both
the English and American law on the subject prior to the passage of
the Anti-Trust Act. a. It is certain that, at a very remote period, the
words "contract in restraint of trade" in England came to refer to
some voluntary restraint put by contract by an individual on his
right to carry on his trade or calling. Originally all such
contracts were considered to be illegal, because it was deemed they
were injurious to the public, as well as to the individuals who
made them. In the interest of the freedom of individuals to
contract, this doctrine was modified so that it was only when a
restraint by contract was so general as to be coterminous with the
kingdom that it was treated as void. That is to say, if the
restraint was partial in its operation and was otherwise
reasonable, the contract was held to be valid. b. Monopolies were defined by Lord Coke as follows:

															"A monopoly is an institution, or allowance by the king by his
grant, commission, or otherwise to any person or persons, bodies
politic or corporate, of or for the sole buying, selling, making,
working, or using of anything, whereby any person or persons,
bodies politic or corporate, are sought to be restrained of any
freedom or liberty that they had before, or hindered in their
lawful trade."

															(3 Inst. 181, c. 85.)

															Hawkins thus defined them:

															"A monopoly is an allowance by the king to a particular person
or persons of the sole buying, selling, making, Page 221 U. S. 52 working, or using of anything whereby the subject in general is
restrained from the freedom of manufacturing or trading which he
had before."

															(Hawk. P. C. bk. 1, c. 29.)

															The frequent granting of monopolies and the struggle which led
to a denial of the power to create them, that is to say, to the
establishment that they were incompatible with the English
constitution, is known to all, and need not be reviewed. The evils
which led to the public outcry against monopolies and to the final
denial of the power to make them may be thus summarily stated: 1.
The power which the monopoly gave to the one who enjoyed it to fix
the price and thereby injure the public; 2. The power which it
engendered of enabling a limitation on production; and, 3. The
danger of deterioration in quality of the monopolized article which
it was deemed was the inevitable resultant of the monopolistic
control over its production and sale. As monopoly as thus conceived
embraced only a consequence arising from an exertion of sovereign
power, no express restrictions or prohibitions obtained against the
creation by an individual of a monopoly as such. But as it was
considered, at least so far as the necessaries of life were
concerned, that individuals, by the abuse of their right to
contract, might be able to usurp the power arbitrarily to enhance
prices, one of the wrongs arising from monopoly, it came to be that
laws were passed relating to offenses such as forestalling,
regrating and engrossing by which prohibitions were placed upon the
power of individuals to deal under such circumstances and
conditions as, according to the conception of the times, created a
presumption that the dealings were not simply the honest exertion
of one's right to contract for his own benefit unaccompanied by a
wrongful motive to injure others, but were the consequence of a
contract or course of dealing of such a character as to give rise
to the presumption of an intent to injure others through the means,
for instance, of a monopolistic increase of prices. Page 221 U. S. 53 This is illustrated by the definition of engrossing found in the
statute, 5 and 6 Edw. VI, ch. 14, as follows:

															"Whatsoever person or persons . . . shall engross or get into
his or their hands by buying, contracting, or promise-taking, other
than by demise, grant, or lease of land, or tithe, any corn growing
in the fields, or any other corn or grain, butter, cheese, fish, or
other dead victual, whatsoever, within the realm of England, to the
intent to sell the same again, shall be accepted, repute, and taken
an unlawful engrosser or engrossers."

															As, by the statutes providing against engrossing, the quantity
engrossed was not required to be the whole or a proximate part of
the whole of an article, it is clear that there was a wide
difference between monopoly and engrossing, etc. But, as the
principal wrong which it was deemed would result from monopoly,
that is, an enhancement of the price, was the same wrong to which
it was thought the prohibited engrossment would give rise, it came
to pass that monopoly and engrossing were regarded as virtually one
and the same thing. In other words, the prohibited act of
engrossing, because of its inevitable accomplishment of one of the
evils deemed to be engendered by monopoly, came to be referred to
as being a monopoly or constituting an attempt to monopolize. Thus,
Pollexfen, in his argument in East India Company v.
Sandys, Skin. 165, 169, said:

															"By common law, he said that trade is free, and for that cited 3
Inst. 81; F.B. 65; 1 Roll. 4; that the common law is as much
against 'monopoly' as 'engrossing;' and that they differ only, that
a 'monopoly' is by patent from the king, the other is by the act of
the subject between party and party; but that the mischiefs are the
same from both, and there is the same law against both. Moore, 673;
11 Rep. 84. The sole trade of anything is 'engrossing' ex rei
natura, for whosoever hath the sole trade of buying and
selling hath 'engrossed' that trade, and whosoever Page 221 U. S. 54 hath the sole trade to any country hath the sole trade of buying
and selling the produce of that country, at his own price, which is
an 'engrossing.'"

															And, by operation of the mental process which led to considering
as a monopoly acts which, although they did not constitute a
monopoly, were thought to produce some of its baneful effects, so
also because of the impediment or burden to the due course of trade
which they produced, such acts came to be referred to as in
restraint of trade. This is shown by my Lord Coke's definition of
monopoly as being

															"an institution or allowance . . . whereby any person or
persons, bodies politic or corporate, are sought to be restrained
of any freedom or liberty that they had before or hindered in their
lawful trade."

															It is illustrated also by the definition which Hawkins gives of
monopoly wherein it is said that the effect of monopoly is to
restrain the citizen "from the freedom of manufacturing or trading
which he had before." And see especially the opinion of
Parker, C.J., in Mitchel v. Reynolds (1711), 1 P.
Williams, 181, where a classification is made of monopoly which
brings it generically within the description of restraint of
trade.

															Generalizing these considerations, the situation is this: 1.
That, by the common law, monopolies were unlawful because of their
restriction upon individual freedom of contract and their injury to
the public. 2. That as to necessaries of life, the freedom of the
individual to deal was restricted where the nature and character of
the dealing was such as to engender the presumption of intent to
bring about at least one of the injuries which it was deemed would
result from monopoly, that is, an undue enhancement of price. 3.
That, to protect the freedom of contract of the individual not only
in his own interest, but principally in the interest of the common
weal, a contract of an individual by which he put an unreasonable
restraint upon himself as to carrying on his trade or business Page 221 U. S. 55 was void. And that, at common law, the evils consequent upon
engrossing, etc., caused those things to be treated as coming
within monopoly, and sometimes to be called monopoly, and the same
considerations caused monopoly, because of its operation and
effect, to be brought within and spoken of generally as impeding
the due course of, or being in restraint of, trade.

															From the development of more accurate economic conceptions and
the changes in conditions of society, it came to be recognized that
the acts prohibited by the engrossing, forestalling, etc., statutes
did not have the harmful tendency which they were presumed to have
when the legislation concerning them was enacted, and therefore did
not justify the presumption which had previously been deduced from
them, but, on the contrary, such acts tended to fructify and
develop trade. See the statutes of 12th George III, ch.
71, enacted in 1772, and statute of 7 and 8 Victoria, ch. 24,
enacted in 1844, repealing the prohibitions against engrossing,
forestalling, etc., upon the express ground that the prohibited
acts had come to be considered as favorable to the development of,
and not in restraint of, trade. It is remarkable that nowhere at
common law can there be found a prohibition against the creation of
monopoly by an individual. This would seem to manifest, either
consciously or intuitively, a profound conception as to the
inevitable operation of economic forces and the equipoise or
balance in favor of the protection of the rights of individuals
which resulted. That is to say, as it was deemed that monopoly in
the concrete could only arise from an act of sovereign power, and,
such sovereign power being restrained, prohibitions as to
individuals were directed not against the creation of monopoly, but
were only applied to such acts in relation to particular subjects
as to which it was deemed, if not restrained, some of the
consequences of monopoly might result. After all, this was but an
instinctive recognition Page 221 U. S. 56 of the truisms that the course of trade could not be made free
by obstructing it, and that an individual's right to trade could
not be protected by destroying such right.

															From the review just made, it clearly results that, outside of
the restrictions resulting from the want of power in an individual
to voluntarily and unreasonably restrain his right to carry on his
trade or business, and outside of the want of right to restrain the
free course of trade by contracts or acts which implied a wrongful
purpose, freedom to contract and to abstain from contracting, and
to exercise every reasonable right incident thereto, became the
rule in the English law. The scope and effect of this freedom to
trade and contract is clearly shown by the decision in Mogul
Steamship Co. v. McGregor (1892), A.C. 25. While it is true
that the decision of the House of Lords in the case in question was
announced shortly after the passage of the Anti-Trust Act, it
serves reflexly to show the exact state of the law in England at
the time the Antitrust statute was enacted.

															In this country also, the acts from which it was deemed there
resulted a part, if not all, of the injurious consequences ascribed
to monopoly came to be referred to as a monopoly itself. In other
words, here, as had been the case in England, practical common
sense caused attention to be concentrated not upon the
theoretically correct name to be given to the condition or acts
which gave rise to a harmful result, but to the result itself, and
to the remedying of the evils which it produced. The statement just
made is illustrated by an early statute of the Province of
Massachusetts, that is, chap. 31 of the laws of 1778-1779, by which
monopoly and forestalling were expressly treated as one and the
same thing.

															It is also true that, while the principles concerning contracts
in restraint of trade, that is, voluntary restraint put by a person
on his right to pursue his calling, hence only operating
subjectively, came generally to be recognized Page 221 U. S. 57 in accordance with the English rule, it came moreover to pass
that contracts or acts which it was considered had a monopolistic
tendency, especially those which were thought to unduly diminish
competition, and hence to enhance prices -- in other words, to
monopolize -- came also in a generic sense to be spoken of and
treated, as they had been in England, as restricting the due course
of trade, and therefore as being in restraint of trade. The dread
of monopoly as an emanation of governmental power, while it passed
at an early date out of mind in this country as a result of the
structure of our Government, did not serve to assuage the fear as
to the evil consequences which might arise from the acts of
individuals producing or tending to produce the consequences of
monopoly. It resulted that treating such acts as we have said as
amounting to monopoly, sometimes constitutional restrictions, again
legislative enactments or judicial decisions, served to enforce and
illustrate the purpose to prevent the occurrence of the evils
recognized in the mother country as consequent upon monopoly, by
providing against contracts or acts of individuals or combinations
of individuals or corporations deemed to be conducive to such
results. To refer to the constitutional or legislative provisions
on the subject or many judicial decisions which illustrate it would
unnecessarily prolong this opinion. We append in the margin a note
to treatises, &c., wherein are contained references to
constitutional and statutory provisions and to numerous decisions,
etc., relating to the subject. [ Footnote 5 ]

															It will be found that, as modern conditions arose, the trend of
legislation and judicial decision came more and more to adapt the
recognized restrictions to new manifestations of conduct or of
dealing which it was thought Page 221 U. S. 58 justified the inference of intent to do the wrongs which it had
been the purpose to prevent from the beginning. The evolution is
clearly pointed out in National Cotton Oil Co. v. Texas, 197 U. S. 115 , and Shawnee Compress Co. v. Anderson, 209 U.
S. 423 ; and, indeed, will be found to be illustrated in
various aspects by the decisions of this court which have been
concerned with the enforcement of the act we are now
considering.

															Without going into detail, and but very briefly surveying the
whole field, it may be with accuracy said that the dread of
enhancement of prices and of other wrongs which it was thought
would flow from the undue limitation on competitive conditions
caused by contracts or other acts of individuals or corporations
led, as a matter of public policy, to the prohibition or treating
as illegal all contracts or acts which were unreasonably
restrictive of competitive conditions, either from the nature or
character of the contract or act or where the surrounding
circumstances were such as to justify the conclusion that they had
not been entered into or performed with the legitimate purpose of
reasonably forwarding personal interest and developing trade, but,
on the contrary, were of such a character as to give rise to the
inference or presumption that they had been entered into or done
with the intent to do wrong to the general public and to limit the
right of individuals, thus restraining the free flow of commerce
and tending to bring about the evils, such as enhancement of
prices, which were considered to be against public policy. It is
equally true to say that the survey of the legislation in this
country on this subject from the beginning will show, depending as
it did upon the economic conceptions which obtained at the time
when the legislation was adopted or judicial decision was rendered,
that contracts or acts were at one time deemed to be of such a
character as to justify the inference of wrongful intent which
were, at another period, thought not to be Page 221 U. S. 59 of that character. But this again, as we have seen, simply
followed the line of development of the law of England.

															Let us consider the language of the first and second sections,
guided by the principle that, where words are employed in a statute
which had at the time a well known meaning at common law or in the
law of this country, they are presumed to have been used in that
sense unless the context compels to the contrary. [ Footnote 6 ]

															As to the first section, the words to be interpreted are:

															"Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise,
or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce . . . is hereby
declared to be illegal."

															As there is no room for dispute that the statute was intended to
formulate a rule for the regulation of interstate and foreign
commerce, the question is what was the rule which it adopted?

															In view of the common law and the law in this country as to
restraint of trade, which we have reviewed, and the illuminating
effect which that history must have under the rule to which we have
referred, we think it results: a. That the context manifests that the statute was
drawn in the light of the existing practical conception of the law
of restraint of trade, because it groups as within that class not
only contracts which were in restraint of trade in the subjective
sense, but all contracts or acts which theoretically were attempts
to monopolize, yet which, in practice, had come to be considered as
in restraint of trade in a broad sense. b. That, in view of the many new forms of contracts and
combinations which were being evolved from existing economic
conditions, it was deemed essential by an all-embracing enumeration
to make sure that no form of contract or combination by which an
undue restraint of Page 221 U. S. 60 interstate or foreign commerce was brought about could save such
restraint from condemnation. The statute, under this view,
evidenced the intent not to restrain the right to make and enforce
contracts, whether resulting from combination or otherwise, which
did not unduly restrain interstate or foreign commerce, but to
protect that commerce from being restrained by methods, whether old
or new, which would constitute an interference that is an undue
restraint. c. And as the contracts or acts embraced in the
provision were not expressly defined, since the enumeration
addressed itself simply to classes of acts, those classes being
broad enough to embrace every conceivable contract or combination
which could be made concerning trade or commerce or the subjects of
such commerce, and thus caused any act done by any of the
enumerated methods anywhere in the whole field of human activity to
be illegal if in restraint of trade, it inevitably follows that the
provision necessarily called for the exercise of judgment which
required that some standard should be resorted to for the purpose
of determining whether the prohibitions contained in the statute
had or had not in any given ease been violated. Thus, not
specifying but indubitably contemplating and requiring a standard,
it follows that it was intended that the standard of reason which
had been applied at the common law, and in this country, in dealing
with subjects of the character embraced by the statute, was
intended to be the measure used for the purpose of determining
whether, in a given case, a particular act had or had not brought
about the wrong against which the statute provided.

															And a consideration of the text of the second section serves to
establish that it was intended to supplement the first, and to make
sure that, by no possible guise could the public policy embodied in
the first section be frustrated or evaded. The prohibitions of the
second embrace Page 221 U. S. 61 "Every person who shall monopolize or attempt to monopolize, or
combine or conspire with any other person or persons, to monopolize
any part of the trade or commerce among the several states, or with
foreign nations, . . ."

															"By reference to the terms of § 8, it is certain that the word
person clearly implies a corporation, as well as an
individual."

															The commerce referred to by the words "any part," construed in
the light of the manifest purpose of the statute, has both a
geographical and a distributive significance, that is, it includes
any portion of the United States and anyone of the classes of
things forming a part of interstate or foreign commerce.

															Undoubtedly, the words "to monopolize" and "monopolize," as used
in the section, reach every act bringing about the prohibited
results. The ambiguity, if any, is involved in determining what is
intended by monopolize. But this ambiguity is readily dispelled in
the light of the previous history of the law of restraint of trade
to which we have referred, and the indication which it gives of the
practical evolution by which monopoly and the acts which produce
the same result as monopoly, that is, an undue restraint of the
course of trade, all came to be spoken of as, and to be indeed
synonymous with, restraint of trade. In other words, having, by the
first section, forbidden all means of monopolizing trade, that is,
unduly restraining it by means of every contract, combination,
etc., the second section seeks, if possible, to make the
prohibitions of the act all the more complete and perfect by
embracing all attempts to reach the end prohibited by the first
section, that is, restraints of trade, by any attempt to
monopolize, or monopolization thereof, even although the acts by
which such results are attempted to be brought about or are brought
about be not embraced within the general enumeration of the first
section. And, of course, when the second section is thus harmonized
with and made as it Page 221 U. S. 62 was intended to be the complement of the first, it becomes
obvious that the criteria to be resorted to in any given case for
the purpose of ascertaining whether violations of the section have
been committed is the rule of reason, guided by the established law
and by the plain duty to enforce the prohibitions of the act, and
thus the public policy which its restrictions were obviously
enacted to subserve. And it is worthy of observation, as we have
previously remarked concerning the common law, that, although the
statute, by the comprehensiveness of the enumerations embodied in
both the first and second sections, makes it certain that its
purpose was to prevent undue restraints of every kind or nature,
nevertheless, by the omission of any direct prohibition against
monopoly in the concrete, it indicates a consciousness that the
freedom of the individual right to contract, when not unduly or
improperly exercised, was the most efficient means for the
prevention of monopoly, since the operation of the centrifugal and
centripetal forces resulting from the right to freely contract was
the means by which monopoly would be inevitably prevented if no
extraneous or sovereign power imposed it and no right to make
unlawful contracts having a monopolistic tendency were permitted.
In other words, that freedom to contract was the essence of freedom
from undue restraint on the right to contract.

															Clear as it seems to us is the meaning of the provisions of the
statute in the light of the review which we have made,
nevertheless, before definitively applying that meaning, it
behooves us to consider the contentions urged on one side or the
other concerning the meaning of the statute, which, if maintained,
would give to it, in some aspects a much wider, and, in every view,
at least a somewhat different, significance. And to do this brings
us to the second question, which, at the outset, we have stated it
was our purpose to consider and dispose of. Page 221 U. S. 63 Second. The contentions of the parties as to the meaning of
the statute and the decisions of this court relied upon concerning
those contentions. In substance, the propositions urged by the Government are
reducible to this: that the language of the statute embraces every
contract, combination, etc., in restraint of trade, and hence its
text leaves no room for the exercise of judgment, but simply
imposes the plain duty of applying its prohibitions to every case
within its literal language. The error involved lies in assuming
the matter to be decided. This is true because, as the acts which
may come under the classes stated in the first section and the
restraint of trade to which that section applies are not
specifically enumerated or defined, it is obvious that judgment
must, in every case, be called into play in order to determine
whether a particular act is embraced within the statutory classes,
and whether, if the act is within such classes, its nature or
effect causes it to be a restraint of trade within the intendment
of the act. To hold to the contrary would require the conclusion
either that every contract, act or combination, of any kind or
nature, whether it operated a restraint on trade or not, was within
the statute, and thus the statute would be destructive of all right
to contract or agree or combine in any respect whatever as to
subjects embraced in interstate trade or commerce, or if this
conclusion were not reached, then the contention would require it
to be held that, as the statute did not define the things to which
it related, and excluded resort to the only means by which the acts
to which it relates could be ascertained -- the light of reason --
the enforcement of the statute was impossible because of its
uncertainty. The merely generic enumeration which the statute makes
of the acts to which it refers and the absence of any definition of
restraint of trade as used in the statute leaves room for but one
conclusion, which is that it was expressly designed not to unduly
limit the application Page 221 U. S. 64 of the act by precise definition, but, while clearly fixing a
standard, that is, by defining the ulterior boundaries which could
not be transgressed with impunity, to leave it to be determined by
the light of reason, guided by the principles of law and the duty
to apply and enforce the public policy embodied in the statute, in
every given case whether any particular act or contract was within
the contemplation of the statute.

															But, it is said, persuasive as these views may be, they may not
be here applied, because the previous decisions of this court have
given to the statute a meaning which expressly excludes the
construction which must result from the reasoning stated. The cases
are United States v. Freight Association, 166 U.
S. 290 , and United States v. Joint Traffic
Association, 171 U. S. 505 .
Both the cases involved the legality of combinations or
associations of railroads engaged in interstate commerce for the
purpose of controlling the conduct of the parties to the
association or combination in many particulars. The association or
combination was assailed in each case as being in violation of the
statute. It was held that they were. It is undoubted that, in the
opinion in each case, general language was made use of which, when
separated from its context, would justify the conclusion that it
was decided that reason could not be resorted to for the purpose of
determining whether the acts complained of were within the statute.
It is, however, also true that the nature and character of the
contract or agreement in each case was fully referred to, and
suggestions as to their unreasonableness pointed out, in order to
indicate that they were within the prohibitions of the statute. As
the cases cannot by any possible conception be treated as
authoritative without the certitude that reason was resorted to for
the purpose of deciding them, it follows as a matter of course that
it must have been held by the light of reason, since the conclusion
could not have been otherwise reached, that the assailed Page 221 U. S. 65 contracts or agreements were within the general enumeration of
the statute, and that their operation and effect brought about the
restraint of trade which the statute prohibited. This being
inevitable, the deduction can in reason only be this: that, in the
cases relied upon, it having been found that the acts complained of
were within the statute and operated to produce the injuries which
the statute forbade, that resort to reason was not permissible in
order to allow that to be done which the statute prohibited. This
being true, the rulings in the cases relied upon, when rightly
appreciated, were therefore this, and nothing more: that, as
considering the contracts or agreements, their necessary effect and
the character of the parties by whom they were made, they were
clearly restraints of trade within the purview of the statute, they
could not be taken out of that category by indulging in general
reasoning as to the expediency or nonexpediency of having made the
contracts or the wisdom or want of wisdom of the statute which
prohibited their being made. That is to say, the cases but decided
that the nature and character of the contracts, creating as they
did a conclusive presumption which brought them within the statute,
such result was not to be disregarded by the substitution of a
judicial appreciation of what the law ought to be for the plain
judicial duty of enforcing the law as it was made.

															But, aside from reasoning, it is true to say that the cases
relied upon do not, when rightly construed, sustain the doctrine
contended, for is established by all of the numerous decisions of
this court which have applied and enforced the Anti-Trust Act,
since they all, in the very nature of things, rest upon the premise
that reason was the guide by which the provisions of the act were
in every case interpreted. Indeed, intermediate the decision of the
two cases, that is, after the decision in the Freight
Association Case and before the decision in the Joint
Traffic Case, the case of Hopkins v. United States, 171 U. S. 578 , was
decided, Page 221 U. S. 66 the opinion being delivered by Mr. Justice Peckham, who wrote
both the opinions in the Freight Association and the Joint Traffic cases. And, referring in the Hopkins case to the broad claim made as to the rule of
interpretation announced in the Freight Association case,
it was said (p. 171 U. S.
592 ):

															"To treat as condemned by the act all agreements under which, as
a result, the cost of conducting an interstate commercial business
may be increased would enlarge the application of the act far
beyond the fair meaning of the language used. There must be some
direct and immediate effect upon interstate commerce in order to
come within the act."

															And, in the Joint Traffic case, this statement was
expressly reiterated and approved and illustrated by example; like
limitation on the general language used in Freight
Association and Joint Traffic cases is also the clear
result of Bement v. National Harrow Co., 186 U. S.
70 , 186 U. S. 92 ,
and especially of Cincinnati Packet Co. v. Bay, 200 U. S. 179 .

															If the criterion by which it is to be determined in all cases
whether every contract, combination, etc., is a restraint of trade
within the intendment of the law is the direct or indirect effect
of the acts involved, then, of course, the rule of reason becomes
the guide, and the construction which we have given the statute,
instead of being refuted by the cases relied upon, is by those
cases demonstrated to be correct. This is true because, as the
construction which we have deduced from the history of the act and
the analysis of its text is simply that, in every case where it is
claimed that an act or acts are in violation of the statute, the
rule of reason, in the light of the principles of law and the
public policy which the act embodies, must be applied. From this it
follows, since that rule and the result of the test as to direct or
indirect, in their ultimate aspect, come to one and the same thing,
that the difference between the two is therefore only that which
obtains between things which do not differ at all. Page 221 U. S. 67 If it be true that there is this identity of result between the
rule intended to be applied in the Freight Association
Case, that is, the rule of direct and indirect, and the rule
of reason which, under the statute as we construe it, should be
here applied, it may be asked how was it that, in the opinion in
the Freight Association Case, much consideration was given
to the subject of whether the agreement or combination which was
involved in that case could be taken out of the prohibitions of the
statute upon the theory of its reasonableness. The question is
pertinent, and must be fully and frankly met, for if it be now
deemed that the Freight Association Case was mistakenly decided or
too broadly stated, the doctrine which it announced should be
either expressly overruled or limited.

															The confusion which gives rise to the question results from
failing to distinguish between the want of power to take a case
which, by its terms, or the circumstances which surrounded it,
considering among such circumstances the character of the parties,
is plainly within the statute, out of the operation of the statute
by resort to reason in effect to establish that the contract ought
not to be treated as within the statute, and the duty in every case
where it becomes necessary, from the nature and character of the
parties, to decide whether it was within the statute to pass upon
that question by the light of reason. This distinction, we think,
serves to point out what, in its ultimate conception, was the
thought underlying the reference to the rule of reason made in the Freight Association Case, especially when such reference
is interpreted by the context of the opinion and in the light of
the subsequent opinion in the Hopkins Case and in Cincinnati Packet Company v. Bay, 200 U.
S. 179 .

															And in order not in the slightest degree to be wanting in
frankness, we say that, insofar, however, as by separating the
general language used in the opinions in the Freight
Association and Joint Traffic cases from the
context Page 221 U. S. 68 and the subject and parties with which the cases were concerned,
it may be conceived that the language referred to conflicts with
the construction which we give the statute, they are necessarily
now limited and qualified. We see no possible escape from this
conclusion if we are to adhere to the many cases decided in this
court in which the Anti-Trust Law has been applied and enforced and
if the duty to apply and enforce that law in the future is to
continue to exist. The first is true because the construction which
we now give the statute does not in the slightest degree conflict
with a single previous case decided concerning the Anti-Trust Law
aside from the contention as to the Freight Association and Joint Traffic cases, and because every one of those
cases applied the rule of reason for the purpose of determining
whether the subject before the court was within the statute. The
second is also true, since, as we have already pointed out, unaided
by the light of reason, it is impossible to understand how the
statute may in the future be enforced and the public policy which
it establishes be made efficacious.

															So far as the objections of the defendants are concerned, they
are all embraced under two headings: a. That the act, even if the averments of the bill be
true, cannot be constitutionally applied, because to do so would
extend the power of Congress to subjects dehors the reach
of its authority to regulate commerce, by enabling that body to
deal with mere questions of production of commodities within the
States. But all the structure upon which this argument proceeds is
based upon the decision in United States v. E. C. Knight
Co., 156 U. S. 1 . The
view, however, which the argument takes of that case and the
arguments based upon that view have been so repeatedly pressed upon
this court in connection with the interpretation and enforcement of
the Anti-Trust Act, and have been so necessarily and expressly
decided to be unsound as to cause the contentions to be plainly
foreclosed and to require no express Page 221 U. S. 69 notice. United States v. Northern Securities Co., 193 U. S. 197 , 193 U. S. 334 ; Loewe v.Lawlor, 208 U. S. 274 ; Swift & Co. v. United States, 196 U.
S. 375 ; Montague v. Lowry, 193 U. S.
38 ; Shawnee Compress Co. v. Anderson, 209 U. S. 423 . b. Many arguments are pressed in various forms of
statement which, in substance, amount to contending that the
statute cannot be applied under the facts of this case without
impairing rights of property and destroying the freedom of contract
or trade, which is essentially necessary to the wellbeing of
society and which it is insisted is protected by the constitutional
guaranty of due process of law. But the ultimate foundation of all
these arguments is the assumption that reason may not be resorted
to in interpreting and applying the statute, and therefore that the
statute unreasonably restricts the right to contract and
unreasonably operates upon the right to acquire and hold property.
As the premise is demonstrated to be unsound by the construction we
have given the statute, of course, the propositions which rest upon
that premise need not be further noticed.

															So far as the arguments proceed upon the conception that, in
view of the generality of the statute, it is not susceptible of
being enforced by the courts because it cannot be carried out
without a judicial exertion of legislative power, they are clearly
unsound. The statute certainly generically enumerates the character
of acts which it prohibits and the wrong which it was intended to
prevent. The propositions therefore but insist that, consistently
with the fundamental principles of due process of law, it never can
be left to the judiciary to decide whether, in a given case,
particular acts come within a generic statutory provision. But to
reduce the propositions, however, to this their final meaning makes
it clear that, in substance, they deny the existence of essential
legislative authority and challenge the right of the judiciary to
perform duties which that department of the government has exerted
from Page 221 U. S. 70 the beginning. This is so clear as to require no elaboration.
Yet let us demonstrate that which needs no demonstration by a few
obvious examples. Take, for instance, the familiar cases where the
judiciary is called upon to determine whether a particular act or
acts are within a given prohibition, depending upon wrongful
intent. Take questions of fraud. Consider the power which must be
exercised in every case where the courts are called upon to
determine whether particular acts are invalid which are, abstractly
speaking, in and of themselves valid, but which are asserted to be
invalid because of their direct effect upon interstate
commerce.

															We come then to the third proposition requiring consideration, viz: Third. The facts and the application of the statute to
them. Beyond dispute, the proofs establish substantially as alleged in
the bill the following facts:

															1. The creation of the Standard Oil Company of Ohio;

															2. The organization of the Standard Oil Trust of 1882, and also
a previous one of 1879, not referred to in the bill, and the
proceedings in the Supreme Court of Ohio, culminating in a decree
based upon the finding that the company was unlawfully a party to
that trust; the transfer by the trustees of stocks in certain of
the companies; the contempt proceedings; and, finally, the increase
of the capital of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey and the
acquisition by that company of the shares of the stock of the other
corporations in exchange for its certificates.

															The vast amount of property and the possibilities of
far-reaching control which resulted from the facts last stated are
shown by the statement which we have previously annexed concerning
the parties to the trust agreement of 1882, and the corporations
whose stock was held by the trustees under the trust and which came
therefore to be held by the New Jersey corporation. But these
statements do not with accuracy convey an appreciation of the Page 221 U. S. 71 situation as it existed at the time of the entry of the decree
below, since, during the more than ten years which elapsed between
the acquiring by the New Jersey corporation of the stock and other
property which was formerly held by the trustees under the trust
agreement, the situation, of course, had somewhat changed, a change
which, when analyzed in the light of the proof, we think
establishes that the result of enlarging the capital stock of the
New Jersey company and giving it the vast power to which we have
referred produced its normal consequence, that is, it gave to the
corporation, despite enormous dividends and despite the dropping
out of certain corporations enumerated in the decree of the court
below, an enlarged and more perfect sway and control over the trade
and commerce in petroleum and its products. The ultimate situation
referred to will be made manifest by an examination of §§ 2 and 4
of the decree below, which are excerpted in the margin. [ Footnote 7 ] Page 221 U. S. 72 Giving to the facts just stated, the weight which it was deemed
they were entitled to, in the light afforded by the Page 221 U. S. 73 proof of other cognate facts and circumstances, the court below
held that the acts and dealings established by the Page 221 U. S. 74 proof operated to destroy the "potentiality of competition"
which otherwise would have existed to such an extent as to cause
the transfers of stock which were made to the New Jersey
corporation and the control which resulted over the many and
various subsidiary corporations to be a combination or conspiracy
in restraint of trade in violation of the first section of the act,
but also to be an attempt to monopolize and a monopolization
bringing about a perennial violation of the second section.

															We see no cause to doubt the correctness of these conclusions,
considering the subject from every aspect, that is, both in view of
the facts established by the record and the necessary operation and
effect of the law as we have Page 221 U. S. 75 construed it upon the inferences deducible from the facts, for
the following reasons: a. Because the unification of power and control over
petroleum and its products which was the inevitable result of the
combining in the New Jersey corporation by the increase of its
stock and the transfer to it of the stocks of so many other
corporations, aggregating so vast a capital, gives rise, in and of
itself, in the absence of countervailing circumstances, to say the
least, to the prima facie presumption of intent and
purpose to maintain the dominancy over the oil industry, not as a
result of normal methods of industrial development, but by new
means of combination which were resorted to in order that greater
power might be added than would otherwise have arisen had normal
methods been followed, the whole with the purpose of excluding
others from the trade, and thus centralizing in the combination a
perpetual control of the movements of petroleum and its products in
the channels of interstate commerce. b. Because the prima facie presumption of
intent to restrain trade, to monopolize, and to bring about
monopolization resulting from the act of expanding the stock of the
New Jersey corporation and vesting it with such vast control of the
oil industry, is made conclusive by considering, 1, the
conduct of the persons or corporations who were mainly instrumental
in bringing about the extension of power in the New Jersey
corporation before the consummation of that result and prior to the
formation of the trust agreements of 1879 and 1882 2, by
considering the proof as to what was done under those agreements
and the acts which immediately preceded the vesting of power in the
New Jersey corporation, as well as by weighing the modes in which
the power vested in that corporation has been exerted and the
results which have arisen from it.

															Recurring to the acts done by the individuals or corporations
who were mainly instrumental in bringing about the Page 221 U. S. 76 expansion of the New Jersey corporation during the period prior
to the formation of the trust agreements of 1879 and 1882,
including those agreements, not for the purpose of weighing the
substantial merit of the numerous charges of wrongdoing made during
such period, but solely as an aid for discovering intent and
purpose, we think no disinterested mind can survey the period in
question without being irresistibly driven to the conclusion that
the very genius for commercial development and organization which
it would seem was manifested from the beginning soon begot an
intent and purpose to exclude others which was frequently
manifested by acts and dealings wholly inconsistent with the theory
that they were made with the single conception of advancing the
development of business power by usual methods, but which, on the
contrary, necessarily involved the intent to drive others from the
field, and to exclude them from their right to trade, and thus
accomplish the mastery which was the end in view. And, considering
the period from the date of the trust agreements of 1879 and 1882
up to the time of the expansion of the New Jersey corporation, the
gradual extension of the power over the commerce in oil which
ensued, the decision of the Supreme Court of Ohio, the tardiness or
reluctance in conforming to the commands of that decision, the
method first adopted and that which finally culminated in the plan
of the New Jersey corporation, all additionally serve to make
manifest the continued existence of the intent which we have
previously indicated and which, among other things, impelled the
expansion of the New Jersey corporation. The exercise of the power
which resulted from that organization fortifies the foregoing
conclusions, since the development which came, the acquisition here
and there which ensued of every efficient means by which
competition could have been asserted, the slow but resistless
methods which followed by which means of transportation were
absorbed and brought under control, Page 221 U. S. 77 the system of marketing which was adopted by which the country
was divided into districts and the trade in each district in oil
was turned over to a designated corporation within the combination
and all others were excluded, all lead the mind up to a conviction
of a purpose and intent which we think is so certain as practically
to cause the subject not to be within the domain of reasonable
contention.

															The inference that no attempt to monopolize could have been
intended, and that no monopolization resulted from the acts
complained of, since it is established that a very small percentage
of the crude oil produced was controlled by the combination, is
unwarranted. As substantial power over the crude product was the
inevitable result of the absolute control which existed over the
refined product, the monopolization of the one carried with it the
power to control the other, and if the inferences which this
situation suggests were developed, which we deem it unnecessary to
do, they might well serve to add additional cogency to the
presumption of intent to monopolize which we have found arises from
the unquestioned proof on other subjects.

															We are thus brought to the last subject which we are called upon
to consider, viz: Fourth. The remedy to be administered. It may be conceded that, ordinarily, where it was found that
acts had been done in violation of the statute, adequate measure of
relief would result from restraining the doing of such acts in the
future. Swift v. United States, 196 U.
S. 375 . But in a case like this, where the condition
which has been brought about in violation of the statute, in and of
itself, is not only a continued attempt to monopolize, but also a
monopolization, the duty to enforce the statute requires the
application of broader and more controlling remedies. As penalties
which are not authorized by law may not be inflicted by judicial
authority, it follows that, to meet the situation with which we are
confronted, Page 221 U. S. 78 the application of remedies two-fold in character becomes
essential: 1st. To forbid the doing in the future of acts like
those which we have found to have been done in the past which would
be violative of the statute. 2d. The exertion of such measure of
relief as will effectually dissolve the combination found to exist
in violation of the statute, and thus neutralize the extension and
continually operating force which the possession of the power
unlawfully obtained has brought and will continue to bring
about.

															In applying remedies for this purpose, however, the fact must
not be overlooked that injury to the public by the prevention of an
undue restraint on, or the monopolization of, trade or commerce is
the foundation upon which the prohibitions of the statute rest,
and, moreover, that one of the fundamental purposes of the statute
is to protect, not to destroy, rights of property.

															Let us then, as a means of accurately determining what relief we
are to afford, first come to consider what relief was afforded by
the court below, in order to fix how far it is necessary to take
from or add to that relief, to the end that the prohibitions of the
statute may have complete and operative force.

															The court below, by virtue of §§ 1, 2, and 4 of its decree,
which we have in part previously excerpted in the margin, adjudged
that the New Jersey corporation, insofar as it held the stock of
the various corporations recited in §§ 2 and 4 of the decree or
controlled the same was a combination in violation of the first
section of the act, and an attempt to monopolize or a
monopolization contrary to the second section of the act. It
commanded the dissolution of the combination, and therefore, in
effect, directed the transfer by the New Jersey corporation back to
the stockholders of the various subsidiary corporations entitled to
the same of the stock which had been turned over to the New Jersey
company in exchange for its stock. To Page 221 U. S. 79 make this command effective, § 5 of the decree forbade the New
Jersey corporation from in any form or manner exercising any
ownership or exerting any power directly or indirectly in virtue of
its apparent title to the stocks of the subsidiary corporations,
and prohibited those subsidiary corporations from paying any
dividends to the New Jersey corporation or doing any act which
would recognize further power in that company, except to the extent
that it was necessary to enable that company to transfer the stock.
So far as the owners of the stock of the subsidiary corporations
and the corporations themselves were concerned, after the stock had
been transferred, § 6 of the decree enjoined them from in any way
conspiring or combining to violate the act or to monopolize or
attempt to monopolize in virtue of their ownership of the stock
transferred to them, and prohibited all agreements between the
subsidiary corporations or other stockholders in the future,
tending to produce or bring about further violations of the
act.

															By § 7, pending the accomplishment of the dissolution of the
combination by the transfer of stock and until it was consummated,
the defendants named in § 2, constituting all the corporations to
which we have referred, were enjoined from engaging in or carrying
on interstate commerce. And, by § 9, among other things, a delay of
thirty days was granted for the carrying into effect of the
directions of the decree.

															So far as the decree held that the ownership of the stock of the
New Jersey corporation constituted a combination in violation of
the first section and an attempt to create a monopoly or to
monopolize under the second section and commanded the dissolution
of the combination, the decree was clearly appropriate. And this
also is true of § 5 of the decree, which restrained both the New
Jersey corporation and the subsidiary corporations from doing
anything which would recognize or give effect to further
ownership Page 221 U. S. 80 in the New Jersey corporation of the stocks which were ordered
to be retransferred.

															But the contention is that, insofar as the relief by way of
injunction which was awarded by § 6 against the stockholders of the
subsidiary corporations or the subsidiary corporations themselves
after the transfer of stock by the New Jersey corporation was
completed in conformity to the decree, the relief awarded was too
broad: a. Because it was not sufficiently specific and
tended to cause those who were within the embrace of the order to
cease to be under the protection of the law of the land and
required them to thereafter conduct their business under the
jeopardy of punishments for contempt for violating a general
injunction. New Haven R.R. v. Interstate Commerce
Commission, 200 U. S. 404 .
Besides, it is said that the restraint imposed by § 6 -- even
putting out of view the consideration just stated -- was moreover
calculated to do injury to the public, and, it may be, in and of
itself, to produce the very restraint on the due course of trade
which it was intended to prevent. We say this since it does not
necessarily follow, because an illegal restraint of trade or an
attempt to monopolize or a monopolization resulted from the
combination and the transfer of the stocks of the subsidiary
corporations to the New Jersey corporation, that a like restraint
or attempt to monopolize or monopolization would necessarily arise
from agreements between one or more of the subsidiary corporations
after the transfer of the stock by the New Jersey corporation. For
illustration, take the pipelines. By the effect of the transfer of
the stock, the pipelines would come under the control of various
corporations, instead of being subjected to a uniform control. If
various corporations owning the lines determined in the public
interests to so combine as to make a continuous line, such
agreement or combination would not be repugnant to the act, and yet
it might be restrained by the decree. As another example, take
the Page 221 U. S. 81 Union Tank Line Company, one of the subsidiary corporations, the
owner practically of all the tank cars in use by the combination.
If no possibility existed of agreements for the distribution of
these cars among the subsidiary corporations, the most serious
detriment to the public interest might result. Conceding the merit,
abstractly considered, of these contentions, they are irrelevant.
We so think, since we construe the sixth paragraph of the decree
not as depriving the stockholders or the corporations, after the
dissolution of the combination, of the power to make normal and
lawful contracts or agreements, but as restraining them from, by
any device whatever, recreating directly or indirectly the illegal
combination which the decree dissolved. In other words, we construe
the sixth paragraph of the decree not as depriving the stockholders
or corporations of the right to live under the law of the land, but
as compelling obedience to that law. As therefore the sixth
paragraph, as thus construed, is not amenable to the criticism
directed against it, and cannot produce the harmful results which
the arguments suggest it was obviously right. We think that, in
view of the magnitude of the interests involved and their
complexity, that the delay of thirty days allowed for executing the
decree was too short, and should be extended so as to embrace a
period of at least six months. So also, in view of the possible
serious injury to result to the public from an absolute cessation
of interstate commerce in petroleum and its products by such vast
agencies as are embraced in the combination, a result which might
arise from that portion of the decree which enjoined carrying on of
interstate commerce not only by the New Jersey corporation, but by
all the subsidiary companies until the dissolution of the
combination by the transfer of the stocks in accordance with the
decree, the injunction provided for in § 7 thereof should not have
been awarded.

															Our conclusion is that the decree below was right, and Page 221 U. S. 82 should be affirmed except as to the minor matters concerning
which we have indicated the decree should be modified. Our order
will therefore be one of affirmance, with directions, however, to
modify the decree in accordance with this opinion. The court below
to retain jurisdiction to the extent necessary to compel compliance
in every respect with its decree. And it is so ordered. [ Footnote 1 ]

															"1st. All the stockholders and members of the following
corporations and limited partnerships, to-wit:"

															"Acme Oil Company, New York."

															"Acme Oil Company, Pennsylvania."

															"Atlantic Refining Company of Philadelphia."

															"Bush & Co. (Limited)."

															"Camden Consolidated Oil Company."

															"Elizabethport Acid Works."

															"Imperial Refining Company (Limited)."

															"Charles Pratt & Co."

															"Paine, Ablett & Co."

															"Standard Oil Company, Ohio."

															"Standard Oil Company, Pittsburg."

															"Smith's Ferry Oil Transportation Company."

															"Solar Oil Company (Limited)."

															"Sone & Fleming Manufacturing Company (Limited)."

															"Also all the stockholders and members of such other
corporations and limited partnerships as may hereafter join in this
agreement at the request of the trustees herein provided for."

															"2d. The following individuals, to-wit:"

															"W. C. Andrews, John D. Archbold, Lide K. Arter, J. A. Bostwick,
Benjamin Brewster, D. Bushnell, Thomas C. Bushnell, J. N. Camden,
Henry L. Davis, H. M. Flagler, Mrs. H. M. Flagler, John Huntington,
H. A. Hutchins, Charles F. G. Heye, A. B. Jennings, Charles
Lockhart, A.M. McGregor, William H. Macy, William H. Macy, Jr.,
estate of Josiah Macy, William H. Macy, Jr., executor; O. H. Payne,
A. J. Pouch, John D. Rockefeller, William Rockefeller, Henry H.
Rogers, W. P. Thompson, J. J. Vandergrift, William T. Wardwell, W.
G. Warden, Joseph L. Warden, Warden, Frew & Co., Louise C.
Wheaton, H. M. Hanna, and George W. Chapin, D. M. Harkness, D. M.
Harkness, trustee, S. V. Harkness, O. H. Payne, trustee; Charles
Pratt, Horace A. Pratt, C. M. Pratt, Julia H. York, George H.
Vilas, M. R. Keith, trustees, George F. Chester."

															"Also all such individuals as may hereafter join in the
agreement at the request of the trustees herein provided for."

															"3d. A portion of the stockholders and members of the following
corporations and limited partnerships, to-wit:"

															"American Lubricating Oil Company."

															"Baltimore United Oil Company."

															"Beacon Oil Company."

															"Bush & Denslow Manufacturing Company."

															"Central Refining Co. of Pittsburg. "

															"Chesebrough Manufacturing Company."

															"Chess Carley Company."

															"Consolidated Tank Line Company."

															"Inland Oil Company."

															"Keystone Refining Company."

															"Maverick Oil Company."

															"National Transit Company."

															"Portland Kerosene Oil Company."

															"Producers' Consolidated Land and Petroleum Company."

															"Signal Oil Works (Limited)."

															"Thompson & Bedford Company (Limited)."

															"Devoe Manufacturing Company."

															"Eclipse Lubricating Oil Company (Limited)."

															"Empire Refining Company (Limited)."

															"Franklin Pipe Company (Limited)."

															"Galena Oil Works (Limited)."

															"Galena Farm Oil Company (Limited)."

															"Germania Mining Company."

															"Vacuum Oil Company."

															"H. C. Van Tine & Company (Limited)."

															"Waters-Pierce Oil Company."

															"Also stockholders and members (not being all thereof) of other
corporations and limited partnerships who may hereafter join in
this agreement at the request of the trustees herein provided
for."

															[ Footnote 2 ] List of Corporations the Stocks of Which Were Wholly
or Partially Held by the Trustees of Standard Oil
Trust Capital S. O. trust

															Stock ownership

															New York State:

															Acme Oil Company, manufacturers $300,000 Entire.

															of petroleum products.

															Atlas Refining Company, manufac- 200,000 Do.

															turers of petroleum products.

															American Wick Manufacturing 25,000 Do.

															Company, manufacturers of lamp

															wicks.

															Bush & Denslow Manufacturing 300,000 50 percent.

															Company, manufacturers of

															petroleum products.

															Chesebrough Manufacturing Com- 500,000 2,661-5,000

															pany, manufacturers of petroleum.

															Central Refining Company (Lim- 200,000 1-67.2 per ct.

															ited), manufacturers of petroleum

															products.

															Devoe Manufacturing Company, 300,000 Entire.

															packers, manufacturers of petro-

															leum.

															Empire Refining Company (Lim- 100,000 80 percent.

															ited), manufacturers of petroleum

															products.

															Oswego Manufacturing Company, 100,000 Entire.

															manufacturers of wood cases.

															Pratt Manufacturing Company, 500,000 Do.

															manufacturers of petroleum

															products.

															Standard Oil Company of New 5,000,000 Do.

															York, manufacturers of petro-

															leum products.

															Sone & Fleming Manufacturing 250,000 Do.

															Company (Limited), manufacturers

															of petroleum products.

															Thompson & Bedford Company 250,000 80 percent.

															(Limited), manufacturers of

															petroleum products.

															Vacuum Oil Company, manufac- 25,000 75 percent.

															turers of petroleum products.

															New Jersey:

															Eagle Oil Company, manufacturers 350,000 Entire.

															of petroleum products.

															McKirgan Oil Company, jobbers of 75,000 Do.

															petroleum products.

															Standard Oil Company of New 3,000,000 Do.

															Jersey, manufacturers of petro-

															leum products.

															Pennsylvania:

															Acme Oil Company, manufacturers 300,000 Do.

															of petroleum products.

															Atlantic Refining Company, manu- 400,000 Do.

															facturers of petroleum products.

															Galena Oil Works (Limited), manu- 150,000 86 1/4 percent.

															facturers of petroleum products.

															Imperial Refining Company (Lim- 300,000 Entire.

															ited), manufacturers of petro-

															leum products.

															Producers' Consolidated Land and 1,000,000 l percent.

															Petroleum Company, producers of

															crude oil.

															National Transit Company, trans- 25,455,200 94 percent.

															porters of crude oil.

															Standard Oil Company, manufac- 400,000 Entire.

															turers of petroleum products.

															Signal Oil Works (Limited), manu- 100,000 38 3/4 percent.

															facturers of petroleum products.

															Ohio:

															Consolidated Tank-Line Company, 1,000,000 57 percent.

															jobbers of petroleum products.

															Inland Oil Company, jobbers of pe- 50,000 50 percent.

															troleum products.

															Standard Oil Company, manufac- 3,500,000 Entire.

															turers of petroleum products.

															Solar Refining Company, manu- 500,000 Do.

															facturers of petroleum products.

															Kentucky:

															Standard Oil Company, jobbers of 600,000 Do.

															petroleum products.

															Maryland:

															Baltimore United Oil Company, 600,000 5,059-6,000

															manufacturers of petroleum prod-

															ucts.

															West Virginia:

															Camden Consolidated Oil Com- 200,000 51 percent.

															pany, manufacturers of petro-

															leum products.

															Minnesota:

															Standard Oil Company, jobbers of 100,000 Entire.

															petroleum products.

															Missouri:

															Waters-Pierce Oil Company, job- 400,000 50 percent.

															bers of petroleum products.

															Massachusetts:

															Beacon Oil Company, jobbers of 100,000 Entire.

															petroleum products.

															Maverick Oil Company, jobbers of 100,000 Do.

															petroleum products.

															Maine:

															Portland Kerosene Oil Company, 200,000 Do.

															jobbers of petroleum products.

															Iowa:

															Standard Oil Company, jobbers of 600,000 60 percent.

															petroleum product.

															Continental Oil Company, jobbers 300,000 62 1/2 percent.

															of petroleum products.

															[ Footnote 3 ]

															Counsel for appellants says:

															"Of the 38 (37) corporate defendants named in section 2 of the
decree and as to which the judgment of the court applies, four have
not appealed, to-wit: Corsicana Refining Co., Manhattan Oil Co.,
Security Oil Co., Waters-Pierce Oil Co., and one, the Standard Oil
Co. of Iowa, has been liquidated, and no longer exists."

															[ Footnote 4 ]

															Of the dismissed defendants, 16 were natural gas companies and
10 were companies which were liquidated and ceased to exist before
the filing of the petition. The other dismissed defendants, 7 in
number, were: Florence Oil Refining Co., United Oil Co., Tidewater
Oil Co., Tide Water Pipe Co. (Ltd), Platt & Washburn Refining
Co., Franklin Pipe Co. and Pennsylvania Oil Co.

															[ Footnote 5 ]

															Purdy's Beach on Private Corporations, vol. 2, pp. 1403, et
seq., chapter on Trusts and Monopolies; Cooke on Trade and
Labor Combinations, App. II, pp. 194-195; Am. & Eng. Ency.Law,
2d ed., article "Monopolies and Trusts," pp. 844 et
seq. [ Footnote 6 ] Swearingen v. United States, 161 U.
S. 446 ; United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U. S. 649 ; Keck v. United States, 172 U. S. 446 ; Kepner v. United States, 195 U. S. 100 , 195 U. S.
126 .

															[ Footnote 7 ]

															"SECTION 2. That the defendants John D. Rockefeller, William
Rockefeller, Henry H. Rogers, Henry M. Flagler, John D. Archbold,
Oliver H. Payne, and Charles M. Pratt, hereafter called the seven
individual defendants, united with the Standard Oil Company and
other defendants to form and effectuate this combination, and since
its formation have been and still are engaged in carrying it into
effect and continuing it; that the defendants Anglo-American Oil
Company (Limited), Atlantic Refining Company, Buckeye Pipe Line
Company, Borne-Scrymser Company, Chesebrough Manufacturing Company,
Consolidated, Cumberland Pipe Line Company, Colonial Oil Company,
Continental Oil Company, Crescent Pipe Line Company, Henry C.
Folger, Jr., and Calvin N. Payne, a copartnership doing business
under the firm name and style of Corsicana Refining Company, Eureka
Pipe Line Company, Galena Signal Oil Company, Indiana Pipe Line
Company, Manhattan Oil Company, National Transit Company, New York
Transit Company, Northern Pipe Line Company, Ohio Oil Company,
Prairie Oil and Gas Company, Security Oil Company, Solar Refining
Company, Southern Pipe Line Company, South Penn Oil Company,
Southwest Pennsylvania Pipe Lines Company, Standard Oil Company, of
California, Standard Oil Company, of Indiana, Standard Oil Company,
of Iowa, Standard Oil Company, of Kansas, Standard Oil Company, of
Kentucky, Standard Oil Company, of Nebraska, Standard Oil Company,
of New York, Standard Oil Company, of Ohio, Swan and Finch Company,
Union Tank Line Company, Vacuum Oil Company, Washington Oil
Company, Waters-Pierce Oil Company, have entered into and became
parties to this combination and are either actively operating or
aiding in the operation of it; that, by means of this combination.
the defendants named in this section have combined and conspired to
monopolize, have monopolized, and are continuing to monopolize a
substantial part of the commerce among the states, in the
territories, and with foreign nations, in violation of section 2 of
the antitrust act."

															" * * * *" "SECTION 4. That, in the formation and execution of the
combination or conspiracy, the Standard Company has issued its
stock to the amount of more than $90,000,000 in exchange for the
stocks of other corporations which it holds, and it now owns and
controls all of the capital stock of many corporations, a majority
of the stock or controlling interests in some corporations, and
stock in other corporations as follows:"

															Total Owned by

															Name of company capital Standard Oil

															stock Company

															Anglo-American Oil Company, Limited � 1,000,000 � 999,740

															Atlantic Refining Company. . . . . . . $ 5,000,000 $
5,000,000

															Borne-Scrymser Company . . . . . . . . 200,000 199,700

															Buckeye Pipe Line Company. . . . . . . 10,000,000 9,999,700

															Chesebrough Manufacturing Company,

															Consolidated . . . . . . . . . . . . 500,000 277,700

															Colonial Oil Company . . . . . . . . . 250,000 249,300

															Continental Oil Company. . . . . . . . 300,000 300,000

															Crescent Pipe Line Company . . . . . . 3,000,000 3,000,000

															Eureka Pipe Line Company . . . . . . . 5,000,000 4,999,400

															Galena-Signal Oil Company. . . . . . . 10,000,000 7,079,500

															Indiana Pipe Line Company. . . . . . . 1,000,000 999,700

															Lawrence Natural Gas Company . . . . . 450,000 450,000

															Mahoning Gas Fuel Company. . . . . . . 150,000 149,900

															Mountain State Gas Company . . . . . . 500,000 500,000

															National Transit Company . . . . . . . 25,455,200 25,451,650

															New York Transit Company . . . . . . . 5,000,000 5,000,000

															Northern Pipe Line Company . . . . . . 4,000,000 4,000,000

															Northwestern Ohio Natural Gas Company. 2,775,250 1,649,450

															Ohio Oil Company . . . . . . . . . . . 10,000,000 9,999,850

															People's Natural Gas Company . . . . . 1,000,000 1,000,000

															Pittsburg Natural Gas Company. . . . . 310,000 310,000

															Solar Refining Company . . . . . . . . 500,000 499,400

															Southern Pipe Line Company . . . . . . 10,000,000 10,000,000

															South Penn Oil-Company . . . . . . . . 2,500,000 2,500,000

															Southwest Pennsylvania Pipe Lines. . . 3,500,000 3,500,000

															Standard Oil Company (of California) . 17,000,000 16,999,500

															Standard Oil Company (of Indiana). . . 1,000,000 999,000

															Standard Oil Company (of Iowa) . . . . 1,000,000 1,000,000

															Standard Oil Company (of Kansas) . . . 1,000,000 999,300

															Standard Oil Company (of Kentucky) . . 1,000,000 997,200

															Standard Oil Company (of Nebraska) . . 600,000 599,500

															Standard Oil Company (of New York) . . 15,000,000 15,000,000

															Standard Oil Company (of Ohio) . . . . 3,500,000 3,499,400

															Swan and Finch Company . . . . . . . . 100,000 100,000

															Union Tank Line Company. . . . . . . . 3,500,000 3,499,400

															Vacuum Oil Company . . . . . . . . . . 2,500,000 2,500,000

															Washington Oil Company . . . . . . . . 100,000 71,480

															Waters-Pierce Oil Company. . . . . . . 400,000 274,700

															That the defendant National Transit Company, which is owned and
controlled by the Standard Oil Company as aforesaid, owns and
controls the amounts of the capital stocks of the following-named
corporations and limited partnerships stated opposite each,
respectively, as follows:

															Total Owned by

															Name of company capital National Trans-

															stock it Company

															Connecting Gas Company . . . . . . . . $ 825,000 $ 412,000

															Cumberland Pipe Line Company . . . . . 1,000,000 998,500

															East Ohio Gas Company. . . . . . . . . 6,000,000 5,999,500

															Franklin Pipe Company, Limited . . . . 50,000 19,500

															Prairie Oil and Gas Company. . . . . . 10,000,000 9,999,500

															That the Standard Company has also acquired the control by the
ownership of its stock or otherwise of the Security Oil Company, a
corporation created under the laws of Texas, which owns a refinery
at Beaumont in that State, and the Manhattan Oil Company, a
corporation, which owns a pipeline situated in the States of
Indiana and Ohio; that the Standard Company, and the corporations
and partnerships named in Section 2, are engaged in the various
branches of the business of producing, purchasing and transporting
petroleum in the principal oil-producing districts of the United
States, in New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Tennessee,
Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana,
Texas, Colorado and California, in shipping and transporting the
oil through pipelines owned or controlled by these companies from
the various oil-producing districts into and through other states,
in refining the petroleum and manufacturing it into various
products, in shipping the petroleum and the products thereof into
the states and territories of the United States, the District of
Columbia and to foreign nations, in shipping the petroleum and its
products in tank cars owned or controlled by the subsidiary
companies into various states and territories of the United States
and into the District of Columbia, and in selling the petroleum and
its products in various places in the states and territories of the
United States, in the District of Columbia and in foreign
countries; that the Standard Company controls the subsidiary
companies and directs the management thereof so that none of the
subsidiary companies competes with any other of those companies or
with the Standard Company, but their trade is all managed as that
of a single person.

															MR. JUSTICE HARLAN concurring in part, and dissenting in
part.

															A sense of duty constrains me to express the objections which I
have to certain declarations in the opinion just delivered on
behalf of the court.

															I concur in holding that the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey
and its subsidiary companies constitute a combination in restraint
of interstate commerce, and that they have attempted to monopolize
and have monopolized parts of such commerce -- all in violation of
what is known as the Anti-Trust Act of 1890. 26 Stat. 209, c. 647.
The evidence in this case overwhelmingly sustained that view, and
led the Circuit Court, by its final decree, to order the
dissolution of the New Jersey corporation and the discontinuance of
the illegal combination between that corporation and its subsidiary
companies.

															In my judgment, the decree below should have been affirmed
without qualification. But the court, while affirming the decree,
directs some modifications in respect of what it characterizes as
"minor matters." It is to be apprehended that those modifications
may prove to be mischievous. In saying this, I have particularly,
in view the statement in the opinion that

															"it does not necessarily follow that, because an illegal
restraint of trade or an attempt to monopolize or a monopolization
resulted from the combination and the transfer of the stocks of the
subsidiary corporations to the New Jersey corporation, Page 221 U. S. 83 that a like restraint of trade or attempt to monopolize or
monopolization would necessarily arise from agreements between one
or more of the subsidiary corporations after the transfer of the
stock by the New Jersey corporation."

															Taking this language in connection with other parts of the
opinion, the subsidiary companies are thus, in effect, informed --
unwisely, I think -- that, although the New Jersey corporation,
being an illegal combination, must go out of existence, they may
join in an agreement to restrain commerce among the States if such
restraint be not "undue."

															In order that my objections to certain parts of the court's
opinion may distinctly appear, I must state the circumstances under
which Congress passed the Antitrust Act, and trace the course of
judicial decisions as to its meaning and scope. This is the more
necessary because the court by its decision, when interpreted by
the language of its opinion, has not only upset the long-settled
interpretation of the act, but has usurped the constitutional
functions of the legislative branch of the Government. With all due
respect for the opinions of others, I feel bound to say that what
the court has said may well cause some alarm for the integrity of
our institutions. Let us see how the matter stands.

															All who recall the condition of the country in 1890 will
remember that there was everywhere, among the people generally, a
deep feeling of unrest. The Nation had been rid of human slavery --
fortunately, as all now feel -- but the conviction was universal
that the country was in real danger from another kind of slavery
sought to be fastened on the American people, namely, the slavery
that would result from aggregations of capital in the hands of a
few individuals and corporations controlling, for their own profit
and advantage exclusively, the entire business of the country,
including the production and sale of the necessaries of life. Such
a danger was thought to be then Page 221 U. S. 84 imminent, and all felt that it must be met firmly and by such
statutory regulations as would adequately protect the people
against oppression and wrong. Congress therefore took up the matter
and gave the whole subject the fullest consideration. All agreed
that the National Government could not, by legislation, regulate
the domestic trade carried on wholly within the several States, for
power to regulate such trade remained with, because never
surrendered by, the States. But, under authority expressly granted
to it by the Constitution, Congress could regulate commerce among
the several States and with foreign states. Its authority to
regulate such commerce was and is paramount, due force being given
to other provisions of the fundamental law devised by the fathers
for the safety of the Government and for the protection and
security of the essential rights inhering in life, liberty and
property.

															Guided by these considerations, and to the end that the people, so far as interstate commerce was concerned, might not be
dominated by vast combinations and monopolies, having power to
advance their own selfish ends, regardless of the general interests
and welfare, Congress passed the Anti-Trust Act of 1890 in these
words (the italics here and elsewhere in this opinion are
mine):

															"SEC. 1. Every contract, combination in the form of
trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or
commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, is
hereby declared to be illegal. Every person who shall make any
such contract or engage in any such combination or conspiracy, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction
thereof, shall be punished by fine not exceeding five thousand
dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding one year, or by both said
punishments, in the discretion of the court. § 2. Every person who
shall monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or combine or conspire
with any other person or persons, Page 221 U. S. 85 to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among
the several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed guilty
of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by
fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not
exceeding one year, or by both said punishments, in the discretion
of the court. § 3. Every contract, combination in form of
trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade
or commerce in any Territory of the United States or in the
District of Columbia, or in restraint of trade or commerce between
any such Territory and another, or between any such Territory or
Territories and any State or States or the District of Columbia, or
with foreign nations, or between the District of Columbia and any
State or States or foreign nations, is hereby declared illegal.
Every person who shall make any such contract or engage in
any such combination or conspiracy, shall be deemed guilty
of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by
fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not
exceeding one year, or by both said punishments, in the discretion
of the court."

															26 Stat. 209, c. 647.

															The important inquiry in the present case is as to the meaning
and scope of that act in its application to interstate
commerce.

															In 1896, this court had occasion to determine the meaning and
scope of the act in an important case known as the Trans-Missouri Freight Case. 166 U.
S. 290 . The question there was as to the validity under
the Anti-Trust Act of a certain agreement between numerous railroad
companies whereby they formed an association for the purpose of
establishing and maintaining rates, rules and regulations in
respect of freight traffic over specified routes. Two questions
were involved: first, whether the act applied to railroad carriers;
second, whether the agreement the annulment of which as illegal was
the basis of the suit which the United States brought. The
court Page 221 U. S. 86 held that railroad carriers were embraced by the act. In
determining that question, the court, among other things, said:

															"The language of the act includes every contract, combination in
the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of
trade or commerce among the several States or with foreign nations.
So far as the very terms of the statute go, they apply to any contract of the nature described. A contract therefore
that is in restraint of trade or commerce is, by the strict
language of the act, prohibited, even though such contract is
entered into between competing common carriers by railroad, and
only for the purposes of thereby affecting traffic rates for the
transportation of persons and property. If such an agreement
restrains trade or commerce, it is prohibited by the statute unless
it can be said that an agreement, no matter what its terms,
relating only to transportation cannot restrain trade or commerce.
We see no escape from the conclusion that if an agreement of such a
nature does restrain it, the agreement is condemned by this act. .
. . Nor is it for the substantial interests of the country that any
one commodity should be within the sole power and subject to the
sole will of one powerful combination of capital. Congress has, so
far as its jurisdiction extends, prohibited all contracts
or combinations in the form of trusts entered into for the purpose
of restraining trade and commerce. . . . While the statute
prohibits all combinations in the form of trusts or otherwise, the
limitation is not confined to that form alone. All combinations which are in restraint of trade or commerce are prohibited, whether in the form of trusts or in any other
form whatever. " United States v. Freight Assn., 166 U.
S. 290 , 166 U. S. 312 , 166 U. S. 324 , 166 U. S.
326 .

															The court then proceeded to consider the second of the above
questions, saying:

															"The next question to be discussed is as to what is the true
construction of the statute, Page 221 U. S. 87 assuming that it applies to common carriers by railroad. What is
the meaning of the language as used in the statute, that"

															"every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise,
or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce among the several
States or with foreign nations, is hereby declared to be
illegal?"

															"Is it confined to a contract or combination which is only in
unreasonable restraint of trade or commerce, or does it include
what the language of the act plainly and in terms covers, all
contracts of that nature? It is now, with much amplification of
argument, urged that the statute, in declaring illegal every
combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy in
restraint of trade or commerce, does not mean what the language
used therein plainly imports, but that it only means to declare
illegal any such contract which is in unreasonable restraint of trade, while leaving all others unaffected by the
provisions of the act; that the common law meaning of the term
'contract in restraint of trade' includes only such contracts as
are in unreasonable restraint of trade, and, when that
term is used in the Federal statute, it is not intended to include
all contracts in restraint of trade, but only those which are in
unreasonable restraint thereof. . . . By the simple use of the term
'contract in restraint of trade,' all contracts of that
nature, whether valid or otherwise, would be included, and not
alone that kind of contract which was invalid and unenforceable as
being in unreasonable restraint of trade. When, therefore, the
body of an act pronounces as illegal every contract or combination
in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States, etc.,
the plain and ordinary meaning of such language is not limited to
that kind of contract alone which is is unreasonable restraint of
trade, but all contracts are included in such language,
and no exception or limitation can be added without placing in the
act that which has been omitted by Congress. . . . If only that
kind of contract Page 221 U. S. 88 which is in unreasonable restraint of trade be within the
meaning of the statute, and declared therein to be illegal, it is
at once apparent that the subject of what is a reasonable rate is
attended with great uncertainty. . . . To say, therefore, that the
act excludes agreements which are not in unreasonable restraint of
trade, and which tend simply to keep up reasonable rates for
transportation, is substantially to leave the question of
unreasonableness to the companies themselves. . . . But assuming
that agreements of this nature are not void at common law, and that
the various cases cited by the learned courts below show it, the
answer to the statement of their validity now is to be found in the terms of the statute under consideration. . . . The
arguments which have been addressed to us against the inclusion of
all contracts in restraint of trade, as provided for by the
language of the act, have been based upon the alleged presumption
that Congress, notwithstanding the language of the act, could not
have intended to embrace all contracts, but only such contracts as
were in unreasonable restraint of trade. Under these circumstances,
we are, therefore, asked to hold that the act of Congress excepts
contracts which are not in unreasonable restraint of trade, and
which only keep rates up to a reasonable price, notwithstanding the
language of the act makes no such exception. In other words, we are
asked to read into the act by way of judicial legislation an
exception that is not placed there by the lawmaking branch of the
Government, and this is to be done upon the theory that the
impolicy of such legislation is so clear that it cannot be supposed
Congress intended the natural import of the language it used. This we cannot and ought not to do. "

															"If the act ought to read as contended for by defendants, Congress is the body to amend it, and not this court, by a
process of judicial legislation wholly unjustifiable. Large
numbers do not agree that the view taken by defendants Page 221 U. S. 89 is sound or true in substance, and Congress may and very
probably did share in that belief in passing the act. The public
policy of the Government is to be found in its statutes, and when they have not directly spoken, then in the decisions of
the courts and the constant practice of the government officials;
but when the lawmaking power speaks upon a particular subject, over
which it has constitutional power to legislate, public policy
in such a case is what the statute enacts. If the law prohibit
any contract or combination in restraint of trade or commerce, a
contract or combination made in violation of such law is void,
whatever may have been theretofore decided by the courts to have
been the public policy of the country on that subject. The
conclusion which we have drawn from the examination above made into
the question before us is that the Anti-Trust Act applies to
railroads, and that it renders illegal all agreements
which are in restraint of trade or commerce as we have
above defined that expression, and the question then arises whether
the agreement before us is of that nature."

															I have made these extended extracts from the opinion of the
court in the Trans-Missouri Freight Case in order to show
beyond question that the point was there urged by counsel that the
Anti-Trust Act condemned only contracts, combinations,
trusts and conspiracies that were in unreasonable restraint of interstate commerce, and that the court, in clear and
decisive language, met that point. It adjudged that Congress had in
unequivocal words declared that " every contract,
combination, in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in
restraint of commerce among the several States" shall be illegal,
and that no distinction, so far as interstate commerce was
concerned, was to be tolerated between restraints of such
commerce as were undue or unreasonable and restraints that were due
or reasonable. With full knowledge of the then condition of the
country and of its business, Congress determined Page 221 U. S. 90 to meet, and did meet, the situation by an absolute, statutory
prohibition of " every contract, combination in the form of
trust or otherwise, in restraint of trade or commerce." Still more;
in response to the suggestion by able counsel that Congress
intended only to strike down such contracts, combinations and
monopolies as unreasonably restrained interstate commerce, this
court, in words too clear to be misunderstood, said that to so hold
was "to read into the act, by way of judicial legislation, an exception not placed there by the lawmaking branch of the
Government." "This," the court said, as we have seen, " we
cannot and ought not to do."

															It thus appears that, fifteen years ago, when the purpose of
Congress in passing the Anti-Trust Act was fresh in the minds of
courts, lawyers, statesmen and the general public, this court
expressly declined to indulge in judicial legislation by inserting
in the act the word "unreasonable" or any other word of like
import. It may be stated here that the country at large accepted
this view of the act, and the Federal courts throughout the entire
country enforced its provisions according to the interpretation
given in the Freight Association Case. What, then, was to
be done by those who questioned the soundness of the interpretation
placed on the act by this court in that case? As the court had
decided that to insert the word "unreasonable" in the act would be
"judicial legislation" on its part, the only alternative left to
those who opposed the decision in that case was to induce Congress
to so amend the act as to recognize the right to restrain
interstate commerce to a reasonable extent. The public
press, magazines and law journals, the debates in Congress,
speeches and addresses by public men and jurists, all contain
abundant evidence of the general understanding that the meaning,
extent and scope of the Anti-Trust Act had been judicially
determined by this court, and that the only question remaining open
for discussion was the Page 221 U. S. 91 wisdom of the policy declared by the act -- a matter that was
exclusively within the cognizance of Congress. But at every session
of Congress since the decision of 1896, the lawmaking branch of the
Government, with full knowledge of that decision, has refused to
change the policy it had declared, or to so amend the act of 1890
as to except from its operation contracts, combinations and trusts
that reasonably restrain interstate commerce.

															But those who were in combinations that were illegal did not
despair. They at once set up the baseless claim that the decision
of 1896 disturbed the "business interests of the country," and let
it be known that they would never be content until the rule was
established that would permit interstate commerce to be subjected
to reasonable restraints. Finally, an opportunity came
again to raise the same question which this court had, upon full
consideration, determined in 1896. I now allude to the case of United States v. Joint Traffic Association, 171 U.
S. 505 , decided in 1898. What was that case?

															It was a suit by the United States against more than thirty
railroad companies to have the court declare illegal, under the
Anti-Trust Act, a certain agreement between these companies. The
relief asked was denied in the subordinate Federal courts, and the
Government brought the case here.

															It is important to state the points urged in that case by the
defendant companies charged with violating the Anti-Trust Act, and
to show that the court promptly met them. To that end, I make a
copious extract from the opinion in the Joint Traffic
Case. Among other things, the court said:

															"Upon comparing that agreement [the one in the Joint Traffic
Case, then under consideration, 171 U. S.
505 ] with the one set forth in the case of United
States v. Trans-Missouri Freight Association, 166 U. S.
290 , the great similarity between them suggests that a
similar result should be reached in the two cases."

															(P. 171 U. S.
558 ). Page 221 U. S. 92 Learned counsel in the Joint Traffic Case urged a
reconsideration of the question decided in the Trans-Missouri
Case, contending that "the decision in that case [the Trans-Missouri Freight Case ] is quite plainly erroneous,
and the consequences of such error are far-reaching and disastrous,
and clearly at war with justice and sound policy, and the
construction placed upon the Anti-Trust statute has been received
by the public with surprise and alarm." They suggested that the
point made in the Joint Traffic Case as to the meaning and
scope of the act might have been, but was not, made in the previous
case. The court said (171 U.S. 171 U. S. 559 )
that

															"the report of the Trans-Missouri Case clearly shows
not only that the point now taken was there urged upon the
attention of the court, but it was then intentionally and necessarily decided."

															The question whether the court should again consider the point
decided in the Trans-Missouri Case, 171
U. S. 573 , was disposed of in the most decisive
language, as follows:

															"Finally, we are asked to reconsider the question decided in the Trans-Missouri Case, and to retrace the steps taken
therein, because of the plain error contained in that decision and
the widespread alarm with which it was received and the serious
consequences which have resulted, or may soon result, from the law
as interpreted in that case. It is proper to remark that an
application for a reconsideration of a question but lately decided
by this court is usually based upon a statement that some of the
arguments employed on the original hearing of the question have
been overlooked or misunderstood, or that some controlling
authority has been either misapplied by the court or passed over
without discussion or notice. While this is not strictly an
application for a rehearing in the same case, yet, in substance, it
is the same thing. The court is asked to reconsider a question but
just decided after a careful investigation of the matter involved.
There have heretofore been in effect two arguments of precisely the
same Page 221 U. S. 93 questions now before the court, and the same arguments were
addressed to us on both those occasions. The report of the Trans-Missouri Case shows a dissenting opinion delivered
in that case, and that the opinion was concurred in by three other
members of the court. That opinion, it will be seen, gives with
great force and ability the arguments against the decision which
was finally arrived at by the court. It was after a full discussion
of the questions involved, and with the knowledge of the views
entertained by the minority as expressed in the dissenting opinion,
that the majority of the court came to the conclusion it did. Soon
after the decision, a petition for a rehearing of the case was
made, supported by a printed argument in its favor, and pressed
with an earnestness and vigor and at a length which were certainly
commensurate with the importance of the case. This court, with
care and deliberation and also with a full appreciation of
their importance, again considered the questions involved in its
former decision. A majority of the court once more arrived at the
conclusion it had first announced, and accordingly it denied the
application. And now, for the third time, the same
arguments are employed and the court is again asked to recant its
former opinion and to decide the same question in direct opposition
to the conclusion arrived at in the Trans-Missouri Case. The learned counsel, while making the application, frankly confess
that the argument in opposition to the decision in the case above
named has been so fully, so clearly, and so forcibly presented in
the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice White [in the Freight
Case ] that it is hardly possible to add to it, nor is it
necessary to repeat it. The fact that there was so close a division
of opinion in this court when the matter was first under
advisement, together with the different views taken by some of the
judges of the lower courts, led us to the most careful and
scrutinizing examination of the arguments advanced by both sides,
and it was after such an examination that the majority of Page 221 U. S. 94 the court came to the conclusion it did. It is not now alleged
that the court on the former occasion overlooked any argument for
the respondents or misapplied any controlling authority. It is
simply insisted that the court, notwithstanding the arguments for
an opposite view, arrived at an erroneous result, which, for
reasons already stated, ought to be reconsidered and reversed. As we have twice already deliberately and earnestly considered
the same arguments which are now for a third time pressed upon our
attention, it could hardly be expected that our opinion should
now change from that already expressed."

															These utterances, taken in connection with what was previously
said in the Trans-Missouri Freight Case, show so clearly
and affirmatively as to admit of no doubt that this court, many
years ago, upon the fullest consideration, interpreted the
Anti-Trust Act as prohibiting and making illegal not only every contract or combination, in whatever form, which was
in restraint of interstate commerce, without regard to its
reasonableness or unreasonableness, but all monopolies or attempts
to monopolize "any part" of such trade or commerce. Let me refer to
a few other cases in which the scope of the decision in the Freight Association Case was referred to: in Bement v.
National Harrow Co., 186 U. S. 70 , 186 U. S. 92 ,
the court said:

															"It is true that it has been held by this court that the act
(Anti-Trust Act) included any restraint of commerce, whether reasonable or unreasonable "

															-- citing United States v. Trans-Missouri Freight
Asso., 166 U. S. 290 ; United States v. Joint Traffic Association, 171 U.
S. 505 ; Addyston Pipe &c. Co. v. United
States, 175 U. S. 211 . In Montague v. Lowry, 193 U. S. 38 , 193 U. S. 46 ,
which involved the validity, under the Anti-Trust Act, of a certain
association formed for the sale of tiles, mantels, and grates, the
court referring to the contention that the sale of tiles in San
Francisco was so small "as to be a negligible quantity," held that
the association was nevertheless a combination in restraint of
interstate trade or commerce Page 221 U. S. 95 in violation of the Anti-Trust Act. In Loewe v.Lawlor, 208 U. S. 274 , 208 U. S. 297 ,
all the members of this court concurred in saying that the Trans-Missouri, Joint Traffic and Northern
Securities cases "hold, in effect, that the Antitrust Law has
a broader application than the prohibition of restraints of trade
unlawful at common law." In Shawnee Compress Co. v.
Anderson (1907), 209 U. S. 423 , 209 U. S. 432 , 209 U. S. 434 ,
all the members of the court again concurred in declaring that

															"it has been decided that not only unreasonable, but all direct
restraints of trade are prohibited, the law being thereby
distinguished from the common law."

															In United States v. Addyston Pipe Company, 85 Fed.Rep.
271, 278, Judge Taft, speaking for the Circuit Court of Appeals for
the Sixth Circuit, said that, according to the decision of this
court in the Freight Association Case, "contracts in restraint of interstate transportation were within
the statute, whether the restraints could be regarded as reasonable
at common law or not."

															In Chesapeake & Ohio Fuel Co. v. United States (1902), 115 Fed.Rep. 610, 619, the Circuit Court of Appeals for the
Sixth Circuit, after referring to the right of Congress to regulate
interstate commerce, thus interpreted the prior decisions of this
court in the Trans-Missouri, the Joint Traffic, and the Addyston Pipe and Steel Co. cases:

															"In the exercise of this right, Congress has seen fit to
prohibit all contracts in restraint of trade. It has not
left to the courts the consideration of the question whether such
restraint is reasonable or unreasonable, or whether the contract
would have been illegal at the common law or not. The act leaves
for consideration by judicial authority no question of this
character, but all contracts and combinations are declared
illegal if in restraint of trade or commerce among the States."

															As far back as Robbins v. Shelby Taxing District, 120 U. S. 489 , 120 U. S. 497 ,
it was held that certain local regulations, subjecting drummers
engaged in both interstate and domestic trade, could not be
sustained by reason of the fact that no discrimination Page 221 U. S. 96 was made among citizens of the different States. The court
observed that this did not meet the difficulty, for the reason that
"interstate commerce cannot be taxed at all. " Under this
view, Congress no doubt acted when, by the Antitrust Act, it
forbade any restraint whatever upon interstate commerce.
It manifestly proceeded upon the theory that interstate commerce
could not be restrained at all by combinations, trusts or
monopolies, but must be allowed to flow in its accustomed channels,
wholly unvexed and unobstructed by anything that would restrain its
ordinary movement. See also Minnesota v. Barber, 136 U. S. 313 , 136 U. S. 326 ; Brimner v. Rebman, 138 U. S. 78 , 138 U. S. 82 , 138 U. S.
83 .

															In the opinion delivered on behalf of the minority in the Northern Securities Case, 193 U.
S. 197 , our present Chief Justice referred to the
contentions made by the defendants in the Freight Association
Case, one of which was that the agreement there involved did
not unreasonably restrain interstate commerce, and said:

															"Both these contentions were decided against the association,
the court holding that the Anti-Trust Act did embrace interstate
carriage by railroad corporations, and, as that act prohibited any
contract in restraint of interstate commerce, it hence embraced
all contracts of that character, whether they were reasonable or
unreasonable. "

															One of the Justices who dissented in the Northern Securities
Case in a separate opinion, concurred in by the minority, thus
referred to the Freight and Joint Traffic cases:

															"For it cannot be too carefully remembered that that clause
applies to 'every' contract of the forbidden kind -- a
consideration which was the turning point of the Trans-Missouri
Freight Association case. . . . Size has nothing to do with
the matter. A monopoly of 'any part' of commerce among the States
is unlawful."

															In this connection, it may be well to refer to the adverse
report made in 1909, by Senator Nelson, on behalf of the Senate
Judiciary Committee, in reference to a certain bill Page 221 U. S. 97 offered in the Senate and which proposed to amend the Anti-Trust
Act in various particulars. That report contains a full, careful
and able analysis of judicial decisions relating to combinations
and monopolies in restraint of trade and commerce. Among other
things said in it which bear on the questions involved in the
present case are these:

															"The Anti-Trust Act makes it a criminal offense to violate the
law, and provides a punishment both by fine and imprisonment. To
inject into the act the question of whether an agreement or
combination is reasonable or unreasonable would
render the act as a criminal or penal statute indefinite and
uncertain, and hence, to that extent, utterly nugatory and void,
and would practically amount to a repeal of that part of the act. .
. . And while the same technical objection does not apply to civil
prosecutions, the injection of the rule of reasonableness or
unreasonableness would lead to the greatest variableness and
uncertainty in the enforcement of the law. The defense of
reasonable restraint would be made in every case, and there would
be as many different rules of reasonableness as cases, courts and
juries. What one court or jury might deem unreasonable,
another court or jury might deem reasonable. A court or jury in
Ohio might find a given agreement or combination reasonable, while
a court and jury in Wisconsin might find the same agreement and
combination unreasonable. In the case of People v.
Sheldon, 139 N.Y. 264, Chief Justice Andrews remarks:"

															"If agreements and combinations to prevent competition in prices
are or may be hurtful to trade, the only sure remedy is to
prohibit all agreements of that character. If the validity of
such an agreement was made to depend upon actual proof of public
prejudice or injury, it would be very difficult in any case to
establish the invalidity, although the moral evidence might be very
convincing. . . ."

															"To amend the Anti-Trust Act, as suggested by this bill, would
be to entirely emasculate it, and for all practical purposes render
it nugatory as a remedial Page 221 U. S. 98 statute. Criminal prosecutions would not lie, and civil remedies
would labor under the greatest doubt and uncertainty. The act as it
exists is clear, comprehensive, certain and highly remedial. It
practically covers the field of Federal jurisdiction, and is in
every respect a model law. To destroy or undermine it at the
present juncture, when combinations are on the increase, and appear
to be as oblivious as ever of the rights of the public, would be a
calamity."

															The result was the indefinite postponement by the Senate of any
further consideration of the proposed amendments of the Anti-Trust
Act.

															After what has been adjudged, upon full consideration, as to the
meaning and scope of the Anti-Trust Act, and in view of the usages
of this court when attorneys for litigants have attempted to reopen
questions that have been deliberately decided, I confess to no
little surprise as to what has occurred in the present case. The
court says that the previous cases, above cited,

															"cannot by any possible conception be treated as authoritative
without the certitude that reason was resorted to for the
purpose of deciding them."

															And its opinion is full of intimations that this court proceeded
in those cases, so far as the present question is concerned,
without being guided by the "rule of reason," or "the light of
reason." It is more than once intimated, if not suggested, that, if
the Anti-Trust Act is to be construed as prohibiting every contract or combination, of whatever nature, which is, in fact, in
restraint of commerce, regardless of the reasonableness or
unreasonableness of such restraint, that fact would show that the
court had not proceeded, in its decision, according to "the light
of reason," but had disregarded the "rule of reason." If the court,
in those cases, was wrong in its construction of the act, it is
certain that it fully apprehended the views advanced by learned
counsel in previous cases and pronounced them to be untenable. The
published reports place this beyond all question. The opinion of
the court Page 221 U. S. 99 was delivered by a Justice of wide experience as a judicial
officer, and the court had before it the Attorney General of the
United States and lawyers who were recognized, on all sides, as
great leaders in their profession. The same eminent jurist who
delivered the opinion in the Trans-Missouri Case delivered
the opinion in the Joint Traffic Association Case, and the
Association in that case was represented by lawyers whose ability
was universally recognized. Is it to be supposed that any point
escaped notice in those cases when we think of the sagacity of the
Justice who expressed the views of the court, or of the ability of
the profound, astute lawyers, who sought such an interpretation of
the act as would compel the court to insert words in the statute
which Congress had not put there, and the insertion of which words,
would amount to "judicial legislation"? Now this court is asked to
do that which it has distinctly declared it could not and would not
do, and has now done what it then said it could not
constitutionally do. It has, by mere interpretation, modified the
act of Congress, and deprived it of practical value as a defensive
measure against the evils to be remedied. On reading the opinion
just delivered, the first inquiry will be that, as the court is
unanimous in holding that the particular things done by the
standard Oil Company and its subsidiary companies in this case were
illegal under the Anti-Trust Act, whether those things were in
reasonable or unreasonable restraint of interstate commerce, why
was it necessary to make an elaborate argument, as is done in the
opinion, to show that, according to the "rule of reason," the act
as passed by Congress should be interpreted as if it contained the
word "unreasonable" or the word "undue"? The only answer which, in
frankness, can be given to this question is that the court intends
to decide that its deliberate judgment, fifteen years ago, to the
effect that the act permitted no restraint whatever of interstate
commerce, whether reasonable or unreasonable, was not in accordance
with Page 221 U. S. 100 the "rule of reason." In effect, the court says that it will
now, for the first time, bring the discussion under the "light of
reason" and apply the "rule of reason" to the questions to be
decided. I have the authority of this court for saying that such a
course of proceeding on its part would be "judicial
legislation."

															Still more, what is now done involves a serious departure from
the settled usages of this court. Counsel have not ordinarily been
allowed to discuss questions already settled by previous decisions.
More than once at the present term, that rule has been applied. In St. Louis, I. M. & S. Ry. Co. v. Taylor, 210 U.
S. 281 , 210 U. S. 295 ,
the court had occasion to determine the meaning and scope of the
original safety Appliance Act of Congress passed for the protection
of railroad employes and passengers on interstate trains. 27 Stat.
531, § 5, c.196. A particular construction of that act was insisted
upon by the interstate carrier which was sued under the Safety
Appliance Act, and the contention was that a different construction
than the one insisted upon by the carrier would be a harsh one.
After quoting the words of the act, Mr. Justice Moody said for the
court:

															"There is no escape from the meaning of these words. Explanation
cannot clarify them, and ought not to be employed to confuse them
or lessen their significance. The obvious purpose of the
legislature was to supplant the qualified duty of the common
law with an absolute duty deemed by it more just. If the
railroad does, in point of fact, use cars which do not comply with
the standard, it violates the plain prohibitions of the law, and
there arises from that violation the liability to make compensation
to one who is injured by it. It is urged that this is a harsh
construction. To this we reply that, if it be the true
construction, its harshness is no concern of the courts. They
have no responsibility for the justice or wisdom of legislation,
and no duty except to enforce the law as it is written, unless it
is clearly beyond the constitutional power of the
lawmaking Page 221 U. S. 101 body. . . . It is quite conceivable that Congress,
contemplating the inevitable hardship of such injuries and hoping
to diminish the economic loss to the community resulting from them,
should deem it wise to impose their burdens upon those who could
measurably control their causes, instead of upon those who are in
the main helpless in that regard. Such a policy would be
intelligible, and, to say the least, not so unreasonable as to
require us to doubt that it was intended, and to seek some
unnatural interpretation of common words. We see no error in this
part of the case."

															And at the present term of this court, we were asked, in a case
arising under the Safety Appliance Act, to reconsider the question
decided in the Taylor case. We declined to do so, saying
in an opinion just now handed down:

															"In view of these facts, we are unwilling to regard the question
as to the meaning and scope of the Safety Appliance Act, so far as
it relates to automatic couplers on trains moving in interstate
traffic, as open to further discussion here. If the court was
wrong in the Taylor case, the way is open for such an
amendment of the statute as Congress may, in its discretion, deem
proper. This court ought not now to disturb what has been so
widely accepted and acted upon by the courts as having been decided
in that case. A contrary course would cause infinite uncertainty,
if not mischief, in the administration of the law in the Federal
courts. To avoid misapprehension, it is appropriate to say that we
are not to be understood as questioning the soundness of the
interpretation heretofore placed by this court upon the Safety
Appliance Act. We only mean to say that, until Congress, by an
amendment of the statute, changes the rule announced in the Taylor Case, this court will adhere to and apply that
rule." C., B. & Q. Ry. Co. v. United States, 220 U.
S. 559 . When counsel in the present case insisted upon a
reversal of the former rulings of this court, and asked such an
interpretation of the Anti-Trust Act as would allow reasonable
restraints of interstate commerce, this Page 221 U. S. 102 court, in deference to established practice, should, I submit,
have said to them:

															"That question, according to our practice, is not open for
further discussion here. This court long ago deliberately held (1)
that the act, interpreting its words in their ordinary acceptation,
prohibits all restraints of interstate commerce by
combinations in whatever form, and whether reasonable or
unreasonable; (2) the question relates to matters of public policy
in reference to commerce among the States and with foreign nations,
and Congress alone can deal with the subject; (3) this court would
encroach upon the authority of Congress if, under the guise of
construction, it should assume to determine a matter of public
policy; (4) the parties must go to Congress and obtain an amendment
of the Anti-Trust Act if they think this court was wrong in its
former decisions, and (5) this court cannot and will not judicially legislate, since its function is to declare the
law, while it belongs to the legislative department to make the
law. Such a course, I am sure, would not have offended the 'rule of
reason.'"

															But my brethren, in their wisdom, have deemed it best to pursue
a different course. They have now said to those who condemn our
former decisions and who object to all legislative prohibitions of
contracts, combinations and trusts in restraint of interstate
commerce, "You may now restrain such commerce, provided
you are reasonable about it; only take care that the restraint in
not undue." The disposition of the case under consideration
according to the views of the defendants will, it is claimed, quiet
and give rest to "the business of the country." On the contrary, I
have a strong conviction that it will throw the business of the
country into confusion and invite widely extended and harassing
litigation the injurious effects of which will be felt for many
years to come. When Congress prohibited every contract,
combination or monopoly in restraint of commerce, it prescribed a
simple, definite rule that all could understand, and which could be
easily applied Page 221 U. S. 103 by everyone wishing to obey the law, and not to conduct their
business in violation of law. But now, it is to be feared, we are
to have, in cases without number, the constantly recurring inquiry
-- difficult to solve by proof -- whether the particular contract,
combination, or trust involved in each case is or is not an
"unreasonable" or "undue" restraint of trade. Congress, in effect,
said that there should be no restraint of trade, in
any form, and this court solemnly adjudged many years ago that
Congress meant what it thus said in clear and explicit words, and
that it could not add to the words of the act. But those
who condemn the action of Congress are now, in effect, informed
that the courts will allow such restraints of interstate commerce
as are shown not to be unreasonable or undue.

															It remains for me to refer, more fully than I have heretofore
done, to another, and, in my judgment -- if we look to the future
-- the most important aspect of this case. That aspect concerns the
usurpation by the judicial branch of the Government of the
functions of the legislative department. The illustrious men who
laid the foundations of our institutions, deemed no part of the
National Constitution of more consequence or more essential to the
permanency of our form of government than the provisions under
which were distributed the powers of Government among three
separate, equal and coordinate departments -- legislative,
executive, and judicial. This was at that time a new feature of
governmental regulation among the nations of the earth, and it is
deemed by the people of every section of our own country as most
vital in the workings of a representative republic whose
Constitution was ordained and established in order to accomplish
the objects stated in its Preamble by the means, but only by
the means, provided either expressly or by necessary
implication, by the instrument itself. No department of that
government can constitutionally exercise the Page 221 U. S. 104 powers committed strictly to another and separate
department.

															I said at the outset that the action of the court in this case
might well alarm thoughtful men who reversed the Constitution. I
meant by this that many things are intimated and said in the
court's opinion which will not be regarded otherwise than as
sanctioning an invasion by the judiciary of the constitutional
domain of Congress -- an attempt by interpretation to soften or
modify what some regard as a harsh public policy. This court, let
me repeat, solemnly adjudged many years ago that it could not,
except by " judicial legislation, " read words into the
Anti-Trust Act not put there by Congress, and which, being
inserted, give it a meaning which the words of the Act, as passed,
if properly interpreted, would not justify. The court has decided
that it could not thus change a public policy formulated and
declared by Congress; that Congress has paramount authority to
regulate interstate commerce, and that it alone can change a policy
once inaugurated by legislation. The courts have nothing to do with
the wisdom or policy of an act of Congress. Their duty is to
ascertain the will of Congress, and if the statute embodying the
expression of that will is constitutional, the courts must respect
it. They have no function to declare a public policy, nor to amend legislative enactments. "What is termed the policy
of the Government with reference to any particular legislation," as
this court has said,

															"is generally a very uncertain thing, upon which all sorts of
opinions, each variant from the other, may be formed by different
persons. It is a ground much too unstable upon which to rest the
judgment of the court in the interpretation of statutes." Hadden v.
Collector , 5 Wall. 107. Nevertheless, if I do not
misapprehend its opinion, the court has now read into the act of
Congress words which are not to be found there, and has thereby
done that which it adjudged in 1896 and 1898 could not be done
without violating Page 221 U. S. 105 the Constitution, namely, by interpretation of a statute,
changed a public policy declared by the legislative department.

															After many years of public service at the National Capital, and
after a somewhat close observation of the conduct of public
affairs, I am impelled to say that there is abroad in our land a
most harmful tendency to bring about the amending of constitutions
and legislative enactments by means alone of judicial construction.
As a public policy has been declared by the legislative department
in respect of interstate commerce, over which Congress has entire
control, under the Constitution, all concerned must patiently
submit to what has been lawfully done until the People of the
United States -- the source of all National power -- shall, in
their own time, upon reflection and through the legislative
department of the Government, require a change of that policy.
There are some who say that it is a part of one's liberty to
conduct commerce among the States without being subject to
governmental authority. But that would not be liberty regulated by
law, and liberty which cannot be regulated by law is not to be
desired. The Supreme Law of the Land -- which is binding alike upon
all -- upon Presidents, Congresses, the Courts and the People --
gives to Congress, and to Congress alone, authority to regulate
interstate commerce, and when Congress forbids any restraint of such commerce, in any form, all must obey its mandate.
To overreach the action of Congress merely by judicial
construction, that is, by indirection, is a blow at the integrity
of our governmental system, and, in the end, will prove most
dangerous to all. Mr. Justice Bradley wisely said, when on this
Bench, that illegitimate and unconstitutional practices get their
first footing by silent approaches and slight deviations from legal
modes of legal procedure. Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616 , 116 U. S. 635 .
We shall do well to heed the warnings of that great jurist. Page 221 U. S. 106 I do not stop to discuss the merits of the policy embodied in
the Anti-Trust Act of 1890, for, as has been often adjudged, the
courts, under our constitutional system, have no rightful concern
with the wisdom or policy of legislation enacted by that branch of
the Government which alone can make laws.

															For the reasons stated, while concurring in the general
affirmance of the decree of the Circuit Court, I dissent from that
part of the judgment of this court which directs the modification
of the decree of the Circuit Court, as well as from those parts of
the opinion which, in effect, assert authority in this court to
insert words in the Anti-Trust Act which Congress did not put
there, and which, being inserted, Congress is made to declare, as
part of the public policy of the country, what it has not chosen to
declare.