By section 1 of the so-called Hepburn Railway Rate Act of 1906 it is provided that " From and after May first, nineteen hundred and eight, it shall be unlawful for any railroad company to transport from any State, Territory, or the District of Columbia, to any other State, Territory, or the District of Columbia, or to any foreign country, any article of commodity, other than timber and the manufactured products thereof, manufactured, mined, or produced by it, or under its authority, or which it may own in whole, or in part, or in which it may have any interest, direct or indirect, except such articles or commodities as may be necessary and intended for its use in the conduct of its business as a common carrier." 57

56 The court quote with approval the following language of the lower court: "The conspiring mills were situated in many States. The consumers [of wall paper] embraced the whole citizenship of the United States. The jobbers and wholesalers, who were to be coerced into contracts to buy their entire demands from the Continental Wall Paper Company or be driven out of business, were in every State. Before the combination each of the combining companies was engaged in both state and interstate commerce. The freedom of each, with respect to prices and terms, was restrained by the agreement, and interstate commerce directly affected thereby, as well as by the enhancement of prices which resulted. A more complete monopoly in an article of universal use has probably never been brought about. It may be that the wit of man may yet devise a more complete scheme to accomplish the stifling of competition. But none of the shifts resorted to for suppressing freedom of commerce and securing undue prices, shown by the reported cases, is half so complete in its details. None of the schemes with which this may be compared is more certain in results, more widespread in its operation, and more evil in its purposes. It must fall within the definition of ' a restraint of trade,' whether we confine ourselves to the common-law interpretation of that term, or apply that given to the term as used in the federal act."

57 U. S. Stat, at L. 585.

The constitutionality of this "Commodities Clause" was sus-' tained by the Supreme Court in United States v. Delaware & H. Co., decided May 3, 1909.57a The objections that it was in violation of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution and that it attempted the regulation of a matter not directly concerned with interstate commerce were overruled. It was, however, declared that the ownership by a railway carrier of stock in bona fide corporations manufacturing, producing or owning the commodity carried, is not the "interest direct or indirect" in such commodity, forbidden by the Hepburn Act.