Mercers' Company

“ The Company is now governed by a master, three wardens, and a court of thirty-one or more assistants. The livery fine is 53s. 4d. The Mercers' Company, though not by any means the most ancient of the leading City companies, takes precedence of all. Such anomalous institutions are the City companies, that, curious to relate, the present body hardly includes one mercer among them. In Henry VIII.'s reign the Company (freemen, householders, and livery) amounted to fifty-three persons ”

“ The last link between the two companies was severed as late as the year 1666, when the Great Fire destroyed the office held by the Merchant-Adventurers under Mercers’ Hall. The Haberdashers’ Company was a branch of the Mercers’, which broke off from them in the time of Henry VI. The word ‘mercer’ would seem to imply merchant only, being derived, through the French ‘mercier,’ from the Latin word ‘mercator.’ It is probable that those who were called mercers dealt at first in most commodities, except food and the precious metals. ”

“ The Mercers' Company possesses at least twenty-one gifts of this kind. One of the most considerable of these is that of Lady Campbell, who in 1642 bequeathed £1000 which was to be lent gratis on good security to eight young men of the Mercers' Company; shopkeepers of the mercery were to be preferred, and next to them silkmen [568] .
Not only the City Companies but also the town rulers of most provincial towns and sometimes parish authorities were trustees for such charities. At Ipswich bequests of this kind are especially numerous ”

“ Every time you pick up the newspaper you read about one company merging with another company. Of course, we have laws to protect competition in the United States, but one can't help thinking that, if the trend continues the whole country will soon be merged into one large company. ”

“ The contracting sign painters were merely in the business to make money.
Mr. Merrick got the head of the concern in Cleveland over the telephone within half an hour. He talked with the man at length, and talked with the convincing effect that the mention of money has. When he hung up the receiver Uncle John was smiling. Then he called for the Chicago firm. With this second advertising company he met with more difficulties, and Mr. Warren had to come to the telephone and assure the man that Mr. Merrick was able to pay all he agreed to, and that the money was on deposit in his bank. ”

“ Given a trend towards fewer and fewer sellers which promises to continue, it is clear to me that where the eight leading firms have over 40% of the market, any merger between the leaders or between one of them and a lesser company is vulnerable under § 7, absent some special proof to the contrary. ”

“ Our right is that of representatives of a great trade. We four men, that have been deputed to see you on the matter, have at our backs no less than eight thousand employees—honest, hard-workin' men, whose bread you are taking out of their mouths. We are not afraid of the ordinary vicissitudes of commerce. If ye had quietly worked this monopoly in fair competition, we should have known how to meet ye. ”

“ The emotional impact of a merger between the third and sixth largest competitors in a given market, however fragmented, is understandable, but that impact cannot substitute for the analysis of the effect of the merger on competition that Congress required by the 1950 amendment. ”

“ The test which the Government advocates is that it 'can satisfy its burden of showing that the merger may have the effect of substantially lessening competition by proving (a) the existence of substantial competition between two industries; (b) a high degree of concentration in either or both of the competing industries ”

“ Finally, when he had danced attendance upon them for the better part of two months, he laid before them, at the coffee-and-cigars stage of a dinner in a private room of the Savoy, the details of his proposition. They were to form a Syndicate to take over his property, and place it upon the market; in consideration of their finding the ready money for this exploitation, they were to have for themselves two-fifths of the shares in the Company ultimately to be floated. ”

“ In 1848 the Oakenshaw firm decided to dissolve partnership and retire, rather than face the severe competition which had arisen among calico-printers—their determination proceeding chiefly from an unwillingness to manufacture goods of an inferior quality at a cheaper rate. The profits of the undertaking had been considerable, and Mercer was now free to pursue researches sketched out during the busy years. ”

“ Kintner, The Federal Trade Commission in 1960 Apologia Pro Vita Nostra, 1961 Antitrust Law Symposium 21, 41.↑ For example, in some situations the merger of relatively small competitors may result in creation of an enterprise capable of meaningful competition with a company otherwise in unchallenged domination of an industry. ”

“ CHAPTER X If Isabelle had been curious about her husband's interest in the Pleasant Valley Coal Company, she might have developed a highly interesting chapter of commercial history, in which Mr. Freke and John Lane were enacting typical parts.
The Atlantic and Pacific railroad corporation is, as may easily be inferred, a vast organism, with a history, a life of its own, lying like a thick ganglia of nerves and blood-vessels a third of the way across our broad continent, sucking its nourishment from thousands of miles of rich and populous territory. ”

“ Captain John Merry is desired to speak with Captain Moody, who has a nephew in the Orkneys, to write to him to provide fifteen or sixteen young men, about twenty years old, to be entertained by the Company, to serve them for four years in Hudson's Bay, at the rate of £6 per annum, the wages formerly given by the Company.—From the Company's Order Book, 29th February, 1710.
[45] "This country," it was remarked in 1710, "is composed of persons of various character and different inclinations. One and the other ought to be managed, and can contribute to render it flourishing." ”

“ Giving the matter in parenthesis the most liberal construction, it is only when there is an acquisition of substantially all the property of another corporation in connection with a merger or consolidation that a reorganization takes place. ”

“ Economic arrangements between companies standing in a supplier-customer relationship are characterized as 'vertical.' The primary vice of a vertical merger or other arrangement tying a customer to a supplier is that, by foreclosing the competitors of either party from a segment of the market otherwise open to them, the arrangement may act as a 'clog on competition,' Standard Oil Co. ”

“ Under the system proposed by Owen the instruments of production were to become the property, not of the whole community, but of the particular set of workers who used them. " There is no other alternative," he said, " than National Companies 'for each trade. . . . Thus all those trades which relate to clothing shall form a company such as tailors, shoemakers, hatters, milliners, and mantua-makers; and all the different manufacturers [i.e. operatives] shall be arranged in a similar way; com- munications shall pass from the various departments to the Grand National establishment in London." ”

“ Combine in 1903, with four large manufacturing companies in the merger, and under the presidency of E. D. Metcalf, of Auburn, New York. When this project failed, three independent companies—two in New York and one in Canada, offered themselves for sale to the Harvester Company. It bought one—the Osborne—for six millions, and refused the others.
“We are big enough now,” said Cyrus H. McCormick. “It is not safe for one company to have a monopoly. What we want to do is to regulate competition, not to destroy it.” ”

“ The market share which companies may control by merging is one of the most important factors to be considered when determining the probable effects of the combination on effective competition in the relevant market.71 In an industry as fragmented as shoe retailing, the control of substantial shares of the trade in a city may have important effects on competition. If a merger achieving 5% control were now approved, we might be required to approve future merger efforts by Brown's competitors seeking similar market shares. ”

“ A merger requires public notice whereas stock can be acquired privately. A shareholder dissenting from a merger has the right to receive the appraised value of his shares * * * whereas no shareholder has a comparable right in an acquisition of stock. Furthermore the corporate existence of a merged company is terminated by a merger, but remains unaffected by an acquisition of stock.' Brief for Appellees, 30-31.↑ The legislative history of the 1914 Act is reviewed in Brown Shoe Co. ”

“ That no corporation engaged in commerce shall acquire, directly or indirectly, the whole or any part of the stock or other share capital of another corporation engaged also in commerce, where the effect of such acquisition may be to substantially lessen competition between the corporation whose stock is so acquired and the corporation making the acquisition, or to restrain such commerce in any section or community, or tend to create a monopoly of any line of commerce. ”

“ While agreeing with the Government that, with regard to manufacturing, the relevant geographic market for assessing the effect of the merger upon competition is the country as a whole, Brown contended that with regard to retailing, the market must vary with economic reality from the central business district of a large city to a 'standard metropolitan area'2 for a smaller community. ”

“ This difficulty is accentuated in effecting a merger because of the irrevocable nature of the compact and the almost complete disappearance of lines of demarcation as to the tangible and intangible assets of the various units. These difficulties are overcome in many instances by the promoter’s keeping the terms arrived at with each company a secret. Direct dealing is possible in the case of a merger when the various companies are supplementary to each other, such as would be the case where a selling organization is merged into a manufacturing corporation the product of which it distributes. ”

“ It cannot be denied, however, that all the other elements of good-will may have been acquired and built up by the old company and that without them the new concern would be unable to bring good-will into evidence simply by a change of management. It is true that the merger may be able to build up quickly a good-will of its own through the elimination of competition, and through the full utilization of all the advantages of the different units—such as access to supplies of raw material, favorable trade agreements of various sorts, and the like. ”

“ In twenty-seven years we never had a strike, never a serious discontent with any number of our employees, and we retain to this day the loyal good will of those who bought us out. The factory is still known as the Mills Woven Cartridge Belt Company, and my portrait is in the office with a legend telling of the foundation of the factory. ”

“ It passed and amended § 7 on the premise that mergers do tend to accelerate concentration in an industry. Many believe that this assumption of Congress is wrong, and that the disappearance of small businesses with a correlative concentration of business in the hands of a few is bound to occur whether mergers are prohibited or not. ”

“ Units of traders and producers snowballed by combining into so-called 'trusts.' Competition was threatened. Control of prices was feared. Individual initiative was dampened. While the economic picture has changed, large aggregations or private capital, with power attributes, continue. Mergers go forward. Industries such as steel, automobiles, tires, chemicals, have only a few production organizations. A considerable size is often essential for efficient operation in research, manufacture and distribution. ”

“ The Government may introduce evidence which shows that as a result of a merger competition may be substantially lessened throughout the country, or on the other hand it may prove that competition may be substantially lessened only in one or more sections of the country. ”

“ George’s Company is now distinctly in existence; formed of about twenty accepted Companions, to whose number I am daily adding, and to whom the entire property of the Company legally belongs, and who have the right at any moment to depose the Master, and dispose of the property in any manner they may think fit. Unless I believed myself capable of choosing persons for Companions who might be safely entrusted with this power I should not have endeavoured to form the society at all. ”

“ After signing a contract for the supply of electrical power, whereby he was outrageously robbed but the supply was guaranteed, Mr. Merrick and Arthur returned to the farm.
"That man," said Louise's young husband, referring to the manager of the paper mill, "is an unmitigated scoundrel, sir."
"I won't deny it," replied Mr. Merrick. "It occurs to me he is hiring those poor workmen at low wages and making a profit on all their living necessities, which he reserves the right of supplying from his own store. No wonder the poor fellows get dissatisfied." ”

“ Whatever the wisdom or logic of the Court's assumed arithmetic proportion between the number of single-store concerns and the level of competition within the meaning of § 7 as applied to horizontal mergers, it is simply not possible to make the further assumption that the mere occurrence of market-extension mergers is adequate to prove a tendency of the local market toward decreased competition. ”