150 Iowa 46 | Iowa | 1911
As some of the objections stated in the demurrer to the indictment necessitate a careful consideration of the language of the statute in determining what act or acts are required to constitute the offense described, and also a careful analysis -of the indictment to determine whether any act or acts prohibited by the statute are charged as committed by the defendant, it will be necessary to set out in full the portion of the statute purporting to describe the offense and the indictment in which it was attempted to charge an offense as thus described. The
Any person, firm, company, association or corporation, foreign or domestic, doing business ,in the state of Iowa, and engaged in the production, manufacture or distribution of petroleum or any of its products, that shall intentionally for the purpose of destroying the business of a competitor in any locality, and creating a monopoly .discriminate between different sections, communities or cities of this state, by selling such commodity at a lower rate in one section, community or city than is charged for such commodity by said party in another section, community or city, after making due allowance, for the difference if any, in the grade or quality and in the actual cost of transportation from the point of production, if a raw product, or from, the point of manufacture, if a manufactured product, shall be deemed guilty of unfair discrimination, which is hereby prohibited and declared to be unlawful.
The charging part of the indictment is in the following language:
The said Standard Oil Company of Indiana during the month of August, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and eight, in the county of Lyon, state of Iowa, aforesaid, being then and there a foreign corporation doing business in the state of Iowa, and then and there engaged in the distribution of a product of petroleum, to wit, gasoline, did then and there unlawfully, intentionally, and for the purpose of, destroying the business of a competitor, and creating a monopoly, discriminate between different communities, to wit, the town of Alton, in the county of Sioux, in said state, and the town of Doon, in the county of Lyon, in said state, by charging a lower rate for the same grade of gasoline, after making due allowance for the difference in cost of transportation from the point of manufacture, in the said town of Alton than
So far as this case is concerned, the statute prohibits on the part of a corporation doing business in this state and engaged in the distribution of petroleum or any of its products the intentional selling of such commodity at a lower rate in one community than is charged for such commodity by said distributor in another community, after making due allowance for the difference if any in the grade and quality and in the actual cost of transportation from the point of production or manufacture, such discrimination being for the purpose of destroying the business of a competitor in any locality and creating a monopoly, and the act charged in the indictment is that of unlawfully, intentionally, and for the purpose of destroying the business of a competitor and creating a monopoly discriminating between the town of Alton, in the county of Sioux, and the town of Doon, in the county of Lyon, by charging a lower rate for the same grade of gasoline, after making due allowance for the difference in cost of transportation, 'in the said town of Alton than in the said town of Doon.
III. But the real difficulty with the indictment is not that it charged an offense as committed in another county, but that it charged no offense as committed to Lyon County, and this objection was also raised by the demurrer. As already indicated, there could be no stifling of competition or creation of a monopoly in Doon by selling at a higher rate than in Alton. To constitute the offense alleged, there must have been a selling in Doon at a lower rate than in some other community. Proof of charging a lower rate in some other community would not support the allegation of an unfair discrimination for the purpose of destroying the business of a competitor and creating a monopoly in Doon. It is clear to us that the indictment was drawn under an entire misapprehension of the purpose of the statute, which, as above indicated, was not to prevent injury to the consumer by charging too much, but injury to the public by stifling competition and creating a monopoly, although for the time being the sale at the lower rate might have been to the-consumer’s advantage.
Other questions are discussed, but, as the court did not err in sustaining the demurrer which properly raised the objections above referred to, we need not discuss other objections which piay or may not have been grounds on which the court acted in sustaining the demurrer. One of these objections was the unconstitutionality of the statute, but we would properly be reluctant to declare the statute unconstitutional unless a ruling on that question were essential to the decision of the case.
The judgment of the trial court is therefore affirmed.