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ADDYSTON PIPE COMPANY CASE

ADDYSTON PIPE COMPANY CASE, 175 U.S. 211 (1899). The Supreme Court, by a unanimous decision based on the SHERMAN ANTITRUST ACT, permanently enjoined six producers of cast-iron pipe from continuing an agreement that eliminated competition among themselves. Justice Rufus Peckham, speaking for the Court, denied that the United States v. E. C. Knight Company decision should prevail in this case. He argued that here was a definite conspiracy to interfere with the flow of inter-state commerce and a positive scheme to limit competition and fix prices. This decision, which gave teeth to the Sherman Antitrust Act, encouraged increased federal anti-trust actions after 1900.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Sklar, Martin J. The Corporate Reconstruction of American Capitalism, 1890–1916. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

Sullivan, E. Thomas, ed. The Political Economy of the Sherman Act. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991.

Allen E. Ragan/A. R.

See also Antitrust Laws; United States v. E. C. Knight Company.