Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 22.pdf/337

 The Legal World Important Litigation Satisﬁed that the present methods of ratingoits smelters by the Anaconda Copper ' 'ng mpany are not only destructive in a. widespread degree of the surrounding natural forests but unnecessa, Attorney-General Wickersham caused a b' in equity to be ﬁled at Helena, Mont. March 16 against the com any. Eﬁorts were unsuccessfully made in resident Roosevelt's administration to stop the destruction of the forests resulting from sulphuric and arsenic fumes. o

A bill for the dissolution of the alleged beef trust was ﬁled by United States Attorney Sims in the federal court at Chicago March 21, charging violation of the Sherman anti-trust law. Simultaneously indictments were re turned before Judge Landis against the National Packing Co. and its subsidiary com panies. A short time before, proceedings against the National Packin Co. had been brought by Prosecutor of the leas Garven of Hudson county, in the New Jersey state courts.

The grand jury returned indictments against forty former and present members of the cit councils of Pittsburgh March 21, as the resu t of the confessions of Klein showing that many city government officials had been guilty of grafting. Thirty-one more indict ments were found March 25. Klein himself went to prison March 30 under a three-and one~half-year sentence for graft. These in dictments will doubtless make an unforget able episode in the history of principal cor ruption in the United States.

The trial of Nicholas V. Tschaikovsky and Mme. Breshkovska on charges of criminal activit in the revolutionary o nization took place at St. Petersburgh Marc 8 and 9 behind closed doors. Tschaikovsky was able to p)rove that his presence in Russia was due to usiness reasons and to justify the part he had played in the affairs of his country, and was acquitted. Mme. Breshkovska, how ever, had pleaded guilty of being a social revolutionist, and was sentenced to perpetual exile. The acquittal of Tschaikovsky was due

largely to the success with which the defense discredited the testimony of Pateuk, who is himself serving sentence or murder and other

crimes. cuts were heard by the Supreme Court of the United States in March in two great suits, that of the Standard Oil Company and that involving the constitutionality of

the corporation tax law. In the Standard Oil case, ar uments for the defense were presented by iilihn G. Johnson of Philadelphia, and ohn G. ilburn and Frank L. Crawford of

ew York, and for the Government b

Attorney-General Wickersham and Fran B. Kellogg, hearin lasting three March l4—l6.the The Cgorpomtimi Tax days, cases were argued on March 17-18, by ohn G. Johnson, Ex-Senator Foraker, Maxwel Evarts and others, for the corporations, and by Solicitor-General Bowers for the Government, William D. Guthrie and Victor Morawetz leading a ﬂank movement with the object of showin that if the lax was not levied on the securities and instrumentalities of the States it would be constitutional. For reasons which can only be conjectured, the Court on April 11 set the Standard Oil case,

together with the American Tobacco Co. case, for re-argument, thus deferring the reaching of a decision for several weeks, and possibly for many months.

Imporfanl Legblaflon The bill creating a. public utilities commis sion passed both branches of the New Jersey legislature March 16. The opposition of twelve states is all that will be necessary to secure the defeat of the proposed income tax amendment to the Con stitution. Thus far one state, Virginia, has rejected thepro

sition, and New York hasin

decisively v0 it down by a majority of two votes in the Assembly. Eleven others are generally regarded as unfriendly to it, namely, Maine, New Hampshire, New khrsedy, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, 0 e Island, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, California and Colorado. The amendment has alread been ratiﬁed b Alabama, South Caro lina, ississip i, Okla ma, Illinois and Ken tucky (thoug it is doubtful whether the Kentucky resolution was in proper form). Arkansas, Iowa, Indiana, Louisiana, Minne sota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin are expected to ratify at the earliest opportunity. Congress has passed, and the President has signed legislation amending the federal Employer’s Liability Act so as to 've the state courts concurrent jurisdiction with that of the federal courts in dealing with damage suits growing out of industrial accidents. The passage of this amendment was sharply contested in the Senate, the question of the rights of the states to deal with controversies ansin under the act being raised. The act been amended in such a way as to‘ has a