Am'  MaT  ^7™'   ^  Pr*Ce  °f  GaS0^ne'  223 
This  correspondence  of  the  differences  in  prices  with  Standard  mar- 
keting territories  in  itself  points  to  arbitrary  price  making.  But  the 
arbitrary  character  of  the  inequalities  in  price  is  conclusively  demon- 
strated by  the  facts  (1)  that  as  between  most  of  the  territories 
there  were  no  such  differences  in  demand  or  supply  as  would  explain 
the  frequent  and  unequal  variations  in  prices,  and  (2)  that  the  mar- 
gin between  cost  and  price  was  widely  different  in  the  different  ter- 
ritories. 
These  territories,  if  they  should  continue  to  exist,  would  have  a 
significance  different  from  that  they  now  possess  if  they  were  occu- 
pied by  companies  which  were  separately  owned.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  the  several  Standard  companies  are  interrelated  through  a 
common  body  of  majority  stockholders. 
Throughout  this  report  it  has  been  apparent  that  the  maintenance 
of  different  markets  for  gasoline  by  companies  among  which  there 
exists  a  substantial  community  of  ownership  has  been  of  funda- 
mental importance  in  the  gasoline  situation.  This  condition  should 
be  modified. 
In  the  Federal  Trade  Commission's  Report  on  Pipe-Line  Trans- 
portation of  Petroleum,  and  in  the  preceding  chapter  of  this  report, 
it  has  been  shown  that  control  of  pipe  lines  has  been  a  decisive 
factor  in  giving  certain  large  refining  interests  advantages  over  their 
competitors.  The  combination  of  pipe  lines  with  the  other  branches 
of  the  industry  in  single  business  organizations  has  tended  to  estab- 
lish and  perpetuate  monopoly.  To  be  sure,  three  of  four  large  com- 
petitors exist;  but  the  history  of  their  operations  appears  to  indi- 
cate that,  after  a  preliminary  competitive  onslaught  in  which  a  fairly 
satisfactory  amount  of  business  is  gained,  they  "  dig  themselves  in," 
to  use  a  military  metaphor,  and  thereafter  "  follow  the  Standard 
market."  It  is  noteworthy  that  those  districts  in  which  The  Texas 
Company  and  the  Gulf  Refining  Company  were  engaged  in  business 
along  with  the  Standard  companies  were  by  no  means  always  the 
places  where  prices  of  gasoline  were  low  in  191 5. 
If  competition  is  to  be  effective  in  the  business  of  refining  petro- 
leum and  marketing  petroleum  products,  the  pipe  lines  which  are 
necessary  for  transporting  the  raw  material,  crude  oil,  must  be  made 
available  to  all  refiners  on  equal  and  reasonable  terms  both  as  to 
rates  and  service.  It  has  been  decided  by  the  courts  that  pipe  lines 
are  common  carriers  and  as  such  are  subject  to  the  control  of  the 
Interstate  Commerce  Commission.   It  may  be  that  in  time  their  rates 
