CHAPTER VI
"Indirectness" in Relation to Cases of Non-assent
It is manifest from what has been said, that this doctrine of indirectness can but apply to cases of assent. Lacking assent you have mere torts, invasions of right; and in such cases the doctrine of the maxim "dolus circuitu non purgatur" applies in full force.
It is a striking fact that in no such case has the Supreme Court ever denied a citizen redress for an invasion of his constitutional right and election to engage in national trade!
The acquirement of power by unlawful means, or the unlawful use of it in such manner as possibly to affect the Nation's rights in its trade, never overcomes the prima facie presumption of illegality always arising in such cases. Good purposes are not legally to be deduced from bad purposes or evil acts.
The doctrine of "indirectness," resting upon the lawfulness of what is done, can have no relevancy whatever to that which is in any way unlawfully done—to any tort or conspiracy! When people begin to do unlawful things that may injure national trade, there is always enough "dangerous probability" for the law to interfere at once. "Indirectness" meaning, in this connection, nothing more than "mere unintended possibility from lawful exercise through lawful means, of lawful rights or powers," an intended restraint upon trade itself must be illegal. It is illegal to strive to destroy, in any degree, that upon which public welfare depends. It makes no difference how indirect the means adopted, how
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