Northern Securities Co. v. United States

Northern Securities Co. v. United States, 193 U.S. 197 (1904), argued 14–15 Dec. 1903, decided 14 Mar. 1904 by vote of 5 to 4; Harlan for the Court, Brewer concurring, White and Holmes in dissent. At the end of the nineteenth century, the Court had begun to find some teeth in the Sherman Antitrust Act. However, it was only when Theodore Roosevelt sought to dissolve the Northern Securities Company, which held the stock of three major railroads, that the question arose whether the statute reached stock ownership.

Reading both congressional power and the law broadly, Justice John Marshall Harlan said that the Court could not properly concern itself with any adverse effects on the business community a decision to dissolve the company would have. A majority was formed when Justice David Brewer, who believed that the Sherman Act should apply only to unreasonable restraints of trade, pronounced the restraint here unreasonable. All the dissenters agreed with Justice Edward White's contentions that the restraint shown here was reasonable, that a broad interpretation of the act would unsettle business, and that congressional control over commerce could not embrace stock ownership. They also joined Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes's opinion, which argued that the Sherman Act must be interpreted strictly to ensure its constitutionality; otherwise the most local of transactions would be brought within the ambit of Congress's control of interstate commerce (see Commerce Power). In *Standard Oil Co. v. United States (1911), Chief Justice White persuaded the Court to limit the Sherman Act's reach solely to unreasonable restraints of trade.

See also Antitrust.

John E. Semonche