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The Green Bag

"The water right must," says Judge Morrow, "be the right of the consumer and attached to his land, and not the right of the complainant attached to its canal system. It follows that under the law of this state it cannot be valued as a property right upon which the com plainant is entitled to an income from the water rate to be paid by the consumer." Marriage and Divorce. Desertion — Removal of Statutory Ground by Co habitation during Portion of Three- Year Period. Mass. A statute permitting absolute divorce on the ground of desertion, it was held not to have been "utter desertion" for three consecutive years next prior to the filing of the libel, when the libelant, whose wife had left him, cohabited with her for four days during the three-year period. La Flamme v. La Flamme, 96 N. E. 62, Massachusetts Supreme Judi cial Court, Oct., 1911. Monopolies. Restraint of Trade by International Harvester Company — Party to Unlawful Combination. Mo. The International Harvester Company of America was ousted from Missouri and fined $50,000 by the Supreme Court of that state Nov. 14. Judges Lamm, Brown, Ferris, and Woodson concurred in the opinion. Chief Justice Valliant also wrote an opinion, which was con curred in by Judges Lamm, Brown, and Ferris. It left the amount of the fine to be fixed by the court after the com pany made a showing that it would comply with the law. The opinion found that competition was lessened and that practically all of the harvester business was done by the respondent company in the state. It held that it was contrary to the laws of the state of Missouri for one company to conduct the business of another, as in this case.

Judge Graves in his opinion said : "The respondent was a part and parcel of this gigantic and nefarious scheme. For some years it has been the mere sales agent of the International Har vester Company — the New Jersey com pany. It was licensed in this state to sell its own goods, but it is now selling the goods of another. As such party to an unlawful arrangement or combina tion it should suffer the penalties pre scribed by our laws." Railway Rates. "Long and Short Haul" Clause — Interstate Commerce Commission without Power to Make General Reductions of Rates. U. S. In the Spokane rate case (Interstate Commerce Commission v. Union Pacific R. Co. and Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe R. Co.), the Court of Commerce handed down a decision at Washington Nov. 14, sustaining the validity of the long and short haul clause, but denying the power of the commission to make general reductions instead of fixing particular rates. The Court said : "In so far as the Commission attempts to determine the relation of the longand-short-haul rates, irrespective of absolute rates, it goes beyond any authority that has been vested in it. "The practical effect of the commis sion's order is to either compel a blanket rate from the entire East to the entire West, or to prevent the carriers from getting all the business which they now secure without loss by making rates which enable merchants to meet the market competition." Judge Archbald, dissenting, took the ground that no guide is supplied by Congress for the determination by the Commission of the particular cases in which a higher charge may be made for the shorter haul. The case has been appealed to the United States Supreme Court.