The Knight and Securities cases afford a much stronger instance. Unification by complete ownership took place in both instances. So complete was the analogy that four of the justices held that the law laid down in the former case was overruled by the latter; and yet, on the facts found, identical acts, found in the one case as constituting indirect methods of restraint, were, in the other, found to be direct; and on no question of law did the latter case depart from the former! Both cases are constantly cited by the Supreme Court to justify a single doctrine, and correctly. As has been indicated, the reason is that while the acquisition of "power" to restrain may be viewed with such just suspicion as to make it prima facie dangerous, illegal, to require explanation, that still, if that explanation satisfy the court that there was neither purpose nor interest amounting to dangerous temptation to misapply it, the justly and lawfully acquired power can be lawfully retained; because neither restraint nor the power acquired with interest or intent to restrain exists, necessary to constitute that tendency, which is equally illegal with restraint itself.
To repeat: The doctrine of "direct" or "indirect" restraints would have continued to be explained, as at common law, by a sensible definition of the term tendency, had not the doctrine for identical reasons become so important a one in solving questions resulting from the duality of government and powers in the United States; but having been necessarily so used in regard to such questions generally, it most naturally was also applied to them in this particular respect, as to a national matter. Nevertheless, the
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