ITEMS OF INTEREST October 26, 1912 Issue

ITEMS OF INTEREST

A verdict for eighty thousand dollars and costs was awarded for the plaintiffs, D. E. Loewe & Co. of Danbury, against members of the United Hatters Union of North America in the United States district court at Hartford, Conn., last week. Under the Sherman antitrust law this award will be trebled, making the total amount two hundred and forty thousand dollars. This already famous case has been before the court for nine years, during which time it has gone to the United States court of appeals twice and once to the United States supreme court. In the first jury trial three years ago the award for the plaintiffs was two hundred and twenty-two thousand dollars. Suit was first brought in 1902 against two hundred and forty members of the United Hatters of North America residing in that state, and was based upon the allegation that a conspiracy existed to injure the business of the plaintiff, who is a soft hat manufacturer, because he declined to unionize his factory.

Radical uniform state legislation, based upon the principle of agricultural cooperative credit now in use in practically every country of Europe, is urged by President Taft in a letter to the governors of all the states. He recommends the establishment of land-mortgage banks under state charters, and the formation of cooperative mortgage-bonded societies along the lines of the Landschaften societies of Germany, provided that uniform state legislation can be secured to govern their organization and operation. As a later step he favors the enactment of laws by Congress permitting the organization of national land-mortgage banks, to be operated under strict government supervision with the power to guarantee and market the guaranteed debenture bonds of the state land-mortgage banks or cooperative societies.

The government suit to dissolve the American Naval Stores Company of Savannah as falling. within the prohibitions of the Sherman act, has been brought to hearing in the circuit court of appeals at Atlanta, Ga. The government alleges that the company arbitrarily fixes the price of turpentine and rosin for practically the world; that it controls ninety percent of the American production of these articles and seventy-five per cent of the world's production, and that it has throttled competition. The equity suit is to dissolve the corporation into its component parts as they existed prior to 1902, and to establish a receiver for the properties if the corporation does not comply with such decision of the court.

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