Illinois Commission Co. v. Cleveland Telegraph Co.

• Citation: 119 F. 301
• Decision Date: 28 October 1902
• Docket Number: 846.
• Parties: ILLINOIS COMMISSION CO. et al. v. CLEVELAND TEL. CO. et al.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (7th Circuit)

119 F. 301

ILLINOIS COMMISSION CO. et al. v. CLEVELAND TEL. CO. et al.

No. 846.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

October 28, 1902

The bill as amended, was by the Cleveland Telegraph Company, a corporation and citizen of the State of West Virginia; and the Western Union Telegraph Company; the Postal Telegraph Cable Company; and the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company corporations existing under and by virtue of the laws of the State of New York, against appellants, and others, citizens of the State of Illinois. It set forth in substance, the organization of the Board of Trade of the City of Chicago the general purposes of such Board; its right to make rules regulations and by-laws, for the government of its affairs the fact that it has a membership of about eighteen hundred members, and own an Exchange Building costing upwards of one million dollars; and the manner of its conducting business the latter as follows: that any person of good character and business integrity can become a member of the said Board of Trade upon application, and paying its regular initiation fee, or acquiring in lieu thereof from a member, a transfer of an existing membership, which is readily purchasable; and that said Board of Trade has provided within such exchange building for the exclusive use of its own members only, an exchange hall, where many of its members meet every business day between the market hours of 9:30 a.m. and 1:15 p.m. (except on Saturday, when the market hours are from 9:30 a.m., until twelve o'clock noon) to buy and sell for themselves, or as brokers and agents for their customers, for present and future delivery, all kinds of grain and hog products, the volume of said transactions aggregating many millions of bushels of grain and many million pounds of hog products annually, and having become so large that said exchange is now the greatest grain and provision market in the United States; that said purchases are permitted by said Board of Trade to be made, and are made, only during said market hours, and by viva voce bidding; and the information of the prices thus made in said transactions during said market hours upon said Exchange has become a species of property of such large value to the said Board of Trade, that telegraph companies are willing to pay said Board of Trade large sums of money for the privilege of receiving instantaneously said quotations of prices and selling the same to their customers, and many persons throughout the United States who are engaged in the grain and provision business are willing to pay, and for many years have paid said telegraph companies large sums of money therefor; the prices which telegraph companies are able to get from their customers for the instantaneous and continuous quotations of said Board of Trade being as follows:

From Chambers of Commerce outside of the City of Chicago, from $150.00 to $300.00 per month.

From individuals outside of the City of Chicago when furnished by telegraph instrument known as the 'Morse' instrument, from $125.00 to $175.00 per month.

From same persons when furnished by instrument known as 'Tape Ticker,' from $6.00 to $25.00 per week.

From persons in Chicago, $4.00 per week; and for periodic or non-continuous quotations, as follows:

For quotations every fifteen minutes outside of ticker districts, $20.00 per week; for like quotations every thirty minutes, $10.00 per week; for four (4) quotations daily from $10.00 to $20.00 per month, depending on the number of articles quoted.

The bill further states the manner of collecting and distributing said quotations, as follows:

Experienced persons are placed during market hours, in each of the different parts of the exchange hall of said Board of Trade where the buying and selling of the different commodities is taking place-- these parts being commonly known as 'pits'-- whose duty it is to at once mark on paper every fluctuation in the market price of the commodity dealt in in such pit, and to immediately transmit said written prices by messengers to a telegraph operator on the floor of said exchange hall, who at once transmits them by a certain electrical instrument called a 'transmitter' over telegraph wires connected with said transmitter, and running thence to the various offices and places of business of persons in the city of Chicago, who desire, and are willing to pay for, such quotations, each of such wires being connected in said office with an electrical instrument known as a 'ticker' by means of which the quotations which are thus electrically transmitted over such wires to said ticker, are automatically and immediately printed upon an automatically unrolling roll of paper called a 'tape,' so that persons in said offices can read the same on said tape within less than fifteen seconds after such prices are made in transactions upon such exchange; and such quotations are transmitted to persons outside of the City of Chicago in a similar manner, except that they are required to be and are almost instantaneously retransmitted over telegraph wires by means of a telegraph instrument known as a 'Morse' instrument, this retransmission being necessary in order to send such quotations any considerable distance, and by the method herein indicated said continuous quotations can be conveyed to persons in all the cities and towns of the United States within twenty seconds after said prices are made in said transactions of said exchange; and your orator is informed and believes that the yearly expense to said Board of Trade of collecting said quotations as aforesaid, is more than seven thousand dollars ($7,000.00).

The bill then sets forth the following agreement:

This Agreement, Made this 15th day of April, 1901, between the Board of Trade of the City of Chicago, a corporation, organized under the laws of the State of Illinois, party of the first part, and The Western Union Telegraph Company, a corporation organized under the laws of the State of New York, party of the second part, and the Postal Telegraph Cable Company, a corporation organized under the laws of the State of New York, party of the third part.

Witnesseth: First. The said Board of Trade agrees to furnish, without discrimination or delay, to the said party of the second part and said party of the third part, complete and continuous quotations of prices made in transactions between members of said Board of Trade in its Exchange Hall. Such quotations shall be received by each of said telegraph companies at its office or offices in the City of Chicago, over a wire or wires to be furnished by the said telegraph company, connecting its office or offices with Morse telegraph wire or wires in the exchange building of the said party of the first part, which shall run to and be connected with the Morse telegraph transmitting instrument upon the floor of said exchange; such transmitting instrument to be the only instrument by which such quotations are to be transmitted from the said exchange hall. Said market quotations shall be collected in the different parts of said exchange hall and be brought to the Morse telegraph operator at said transmitting instrument with as much speed, efficiency and completeness as they were prior to June 22, 1900, collected by the said parties of the second and third parts; and shall be transmitted by said operator with the same diligence, promptness and completeness as the same were prior to June 22, 1900, transmitted by the said parties of the second and third part; the operator, Morse telegraph transmitting instrument and wires leading to the various telegraph companies, parties hereto, to be located at the wheat pit, and within reach of the wheat reporter, said operator to be satisfactory to the telegraph companies. The said party of the first part agrees to employ or cause to be employed, without expense to the party of the second or of the third part, a sufficient number of competent persons for the purpose of collecting and transmitting the said quotations of sales upon said exchange hall, including the necessary force of messengers for carrying said quotations and reports to the transmitting operator, so that the parties of the second and third part shall obtain complete and continuous quotations throughout all sessions of said Board of Trade of the prices at which commodities dealt in on said exchange are bought and sold. The party of the first part agrees that the intention of this clause is to insure that the delivery of its quotations to the parties of the second and third parts hereto shall be simultaneous with and in the same manner as their delivery to any other telegraph company or party to whom they may be furnished for distribution. And said Board of Trade further agrees that said telegraph companies may designate some person of good character and proper behavior to take from the blackboard in said exchange hall, as the same is posted there, all market and statistical information which is posted on said blackboard, and that such person shall have a permit to enter said exchange hall for that purpose.

Second. The said parties of the second and third parts agree that they will not knowingly furnish or sell, directly or indirectly, said continuous quotations to any person, firm or corporation conducting a bucket shop, or other similar place where such quotations are used as a basis for bets or other illegal contracts based upon the fluctuations of the prices of commodities dealt in on said Board of Trade; nor will they knowingly continue to furnish said continuous quotations to any person, firm or corporation who shall retransmit or furnish the same to any person, firm or corporation conducting such bucket-shop or other place; provided, however, that nothing in this contract shall be...