ITEMS OF INTEREST July 20, 1907 Issue

ITEMS OF INTEREST

The Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey has just decided an interesting case in favor of the Vulcan Detinning Company, which was organized for the detinning of tin scrap,—the separation of the metallic tin from the steel. The formula and secret process, which were obtained from Holland, were entrusted to certain directors of the company, one of whom afterwards became interested in the American Can Company and sold his stock in the Vulcan Company for a round figure and then resigned. Rival plants were then built by the latter company and the same process used. As a result of the decision the American Can Company was enjoined from using the process, and will be required to account to the Vulcan Company for all the profits it has made from the time it began to use the secret process. The court held that the employes and the chairman of the executive committee were trustees of the secret process, and held it for the sole benefit of the Vulcan Company; that the American Company, by acquiring it from the delinquent servants and officers, must be held likewise as trustees for the Vulcan Company.

The new plan of the Department of Justice in its program of trust prosecution—to apply for Federal receivers in cases where trusts are convicted of violation of the antitrust law—will probably act along one or more of the following lines: That receivers be appointed where possible to sell the plants of the combinations found guilty of violating anti-trust law; that an injunction be issued for the dissolution of the illegal combination in restraint of trade; that contracts or agreements in restraint of trade be abrogated; that conspiracies in restraint of trade shall be punished in accordance with the conspiracy statute, as well as the antitrust law; that criminal sentence be imposed as provided by the anti-trust law. It is expected that one of these lines will be followed in the case of the powder trust and the tobacco trust.

"As chief of the Weather Bureau and president of the Geographical Society," said Willis L. Moore a few days ago, "I have instructed Major Henry E. Hersey, who is with Walter Wellman in his aeronautic attempt to reach the North Pole, and who in that expedition, represents both the bureau and the society, that he is expected to make the dash this summer. I have endeavored to make it clear that we do not intend to lend ourselves to any plan that smacks of sensational advertising without real accomplishment.

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