conspiracy was formed at all material when it appears that the necessary tendency of the particular combination or conspiracy in question is to restrict or suppress free competition?" etc.
On the other hand, Mr. Justice Holmes says, in the Swift case:[1] "The statute gives this proceeding against combinations in restraint of commerce among the States and against attempts to monopolize the same. Intent is almost essential to such a combination, and is essential to such an attempt."
There is, of course, no conflict in these opinions; and reading them together there should be no danger of misunderstanding or confusion. But I have known lawyers who argued that intent was immaterial, as well as those who argued that it must be independently proved. Of course, as a rule, both were wrong, for intent is always material in some sense, though inferable from the acts themselves; while, on the other hand, there are cases where, it not being reasonably inferable from the facts of the alleged conspiracy, it is necessary in some legitimate way to establish it to constitute the offence at all.
Lord Watson states this clearly in Allen vs. Flood, 1898 A. C. 102: "The object of an act, that is the results which will necessarily or naturally follow from the circumstances, in which it is committed, may give it a wrongful character, but it ought not to be confounded with the motive of the actor. To discharge a loaded gun is, in many circumstances, a perfectly harmless proceeding; to fire it on a highway, in front of a restive horse, might be a very different matter."
This will be further considered in the next chapter.
- ↑ 196 U. S 396 (1905).
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