LEGAL PHASES OF COOPEEATIVE ASSOCIATIONS. 41 



In a certain case ^'^ the Aroostook Potato Shippers' Association, act- 

 ing through a committee, blacklisted certain buyers of potatoes. 

 Members of the association under penalty were forbidden to deai 

 with such buyers. Persons outside the association who dealt with 

 persons so blacklisted were also blacklisted and boycotted. The de- 

 fendants, members of the association, were indicted for a conspiracy 

 in restraint of trade and fined. The court said with reference to the 

 contention that section 6 relieved the defendants : 



I do not think that the coercion of outsiders by a secondary boycott, which 

 was discussed in my opinion on the former indictment, can be held to be a 

 lawful carrying out of the legitimate objects of such an association. That 

 act means, as I understand it, that organizations such as it describes are not 

 to be dissolved and broken up as illegal, nor held to be combinations or con- 

 spiracies In restraint of trade ; but they are not privileged to adopt methods 

 of carrying on their business which are not permitted to other lawful associ- 

 ations. 



Section 6 of the Clayton Act is still in effect and is not repealed 

 by the Capper- Volstead Act. 



RIGHT TO SELECT CUSTOMERS. 



It is undoubtedly settled that at common law and in the absence 

 of a statute requiring him to do so a trader or dealer can refuse 

 to enter into business relations with any person whomsoever, and 

 his reason or lack of reason for so doing is immaterial. In a certain 

 case it was said : " We had supposed that it was elementary law 

 that a trader could buy from whom he pleased and sell to whom he 

 pleased, and that his selection of teller and buyer was wholly his 

 own concern." ^^ This principle applies just as fully to cooperative 

 associations or other corporations as it does to individuals. How- 

 ever, the courts have never held that two or more independent deal- 

 ers may agree without a legal cause not to do business with another. 

 Again, when an individual, firm, or corporation does not rest con- 

 tent with refusing to have business relations with a certain person, 

 but endeavors to compel third persons to refrain from having busi- 

 ness relations with such person, the law is violated. This was the 

 situation in the case involving the Aroostook Potato Shippers' As- 

 sociation referred to above. Had the association and its members 

 simply refused to deal with the buyers in question there is little 

 doubt but that the law would not have been violated, but when 

 efforts were made to compel third persons to refrain from dealing 

 with such buyers the law was violated. 



f United States v. King, 229 Fed. 275, 250 Fed. 908. 



«8 Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. v. Cream of Wheat Co., 227 Fed. 46 ; see also 

 United States v. Colgate Co., 250 U. S. 300; Leech v. Farmers' Tobacco Co., 171 Ky. 

 791, 188 S. W. 886. 



