LEGAL PHASES OF COOPERATIVE ASSOCIATIONS. 37 
reached on the theory that the term restraint of trade had a settled 
meaning at the time this statute was passed and that Congress used 
the expression in the same sense as that in which it was then com- 
monly employed. Under the antitrust acts referred to, the Supreme 
Court of the United States in determining whether a defendant is 
engaged in illegally restraining trade will look largely to how it 
employs its power and strength. 
It was upon this theory that the Supreme Court refused to order 
the dissolution of the United States Steel Corporation, 29 although it 
controlled approximately 50 per cent of the steel business of the 
country. In the opinion in this case the court enumerates some of 
the practices which had been employed by other combinations and 
which operated to bring them within the condemnation of the stat- 
ute. The offending combinations referred to include the American 
Tobacco Co. 30 and the Standard Oil Co. 31 Some of the practices in 
question are mentioned in the following quotation from the opinion : 
The corporation, it was said, did not at any time abuse the power or ascendancy 
it possessed. It resorted to none of the brutalities or tyrannies that the cases 
illustrate of other combinations. It did not secure freight rebates ; it did not 
increase its profits by reducing the wages of its employees — whatever it did 
was not at the expense of labor ; it did not increase its profits by lowering the 
quality of its products, nor create an artificial scarcity of them; it did not 
oppress or coerce its competitors — its competition, though vigorous, was fair ; 
it did not undersell its competitors in some localities by reducing its prices there 
below those maintained elsewhere, or require its customers to enter into con- 
tracts limiting their purchases or restricting them in resale prices ; it did not 
obtain customers by secret rebates or departures from its published prices ; there 
was no evidence that it attempted to crush its competitors or drive them out 
of the market, nor did it take customers from its competitors by unfair means, 
and in its competition it seemed to make no difference between large and small 
competitors. 
This decision makes it clear that the legality of a large industrial 
unit depends on its acts and conduct and not on its size. Bigness 
which has come about through development along normal lines and 
without unfair practices or wrongful acts does not constitute ille- 
gality. 
In the American Tobacco Co., in the Standard Oil Co., and in the 
United States Steel Corporation cases the legality of a large indus- 
trial unit or combination was involved. In each of these cases the 
industrial unit or combination as it existed at the time suit was 
brought was the result of the amalgamation or uniting of a number 
of smaller organizations. As already indicated in the discussion 
under this heading, there are ways in which the antitrust laws may 
be violated other than through the illegal organization and operation 
29 United States v. U. S. Steel Corp., 251 U. S. 417. 
30 United States v. American Tobacco Co., 221 U. S. 106. 
31 Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 221 U. S. 1. 
