The Celler-Kefauver Act

Finance a la shmoop what are the Clayton Antitrust Act and the Sherman Antitrust

Act? well they're all about controlling monopolies which a century ago were

called Trust's ironic in that well they essentially stole the trust from the

people, the common Jo, Ma and Pa Kettle well in late 19th century even more so [Ma and Pa Kettle standing together]

than today white men generally ruled the Western

world and were you know very clubby, Bob here in church pew seven likes to do

business with Mike here in pew eight Bob ran a tugboat shipping line hauling [Bob sailing a tugboat]

grain down the Mississippi, Mike here had a bunch of farms and liked to do

business with Bob and well there's Jim here in pew six who runs the entire

region's worth of banks then he liked loaning money to farms because well back [Jim with stack of cash]

then they were always money good to pay their debts yeah there was a time farms

were considered you know safe bet and the three of them formed essentially a

vertical monopoly controlling grain distribution in the center of the [Ship travels through center of the US]

country from creation to distribution to sales to you know all the financing and

banking and stuff underneath it if they wanted to raise prices on the grain for

bread well who was to stop them you know there were no competitors why were there

no competitors, because the three had teamed up to elbow out anyone else [competitor appears and Mike elbows him away]

who might come along and well you know cut them out of the precious resource

flows of whatever was needed and soon the three had enough scale so that if

they were buying resources for a million acres of farmland well, their volume

discount pricing discount discount discount were so massive that they could

undercut anyone who came along wanting to compete fair and square [Prices of grain appear]

well the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 was the first set of anti monopoly laws

to come down the pike like it says right there in the name the act was anti

trusts it was passed to bust up any unfairly organized legal arrangements or [Sherman Antitrust Act strikes company]

would-be monopolies which would prevent from taking advantage of unknowing

consumers and provide for a competitive marketplace because then who wins and a

consumer that's who the government's protecting right so what did this mean [Jim Bob and Mike in a farm]

for poor old Mike Bob and Jim well now they couldn't just raise grain prices

Willy or nilly suddenly there were strictures in place

and our gruesome threesome had to abide by this new rule of law which meant [Jim Bob and Mike in court and judge holds up Sherman Antitrust Act]

pricing their product fairly and reasonably whatever that meant so that

no one was having to sell the family farm to afford to buy a loaf of

sourdough you know for their kids and then clever lawyers defending bazillionaires

poked so many holes in the Sherman Act it looked like one of the real [Lawyer poking holes through document]

housewives after her latest Botox treatment so along came the Clayton

Antitrust Act in 1914 to fill in those holes and puff up the cheeks of law as

it were well any little loopholes discovered by the clever lawyers were [Plasters appear on Sherman Antitrust Act]

closed and more specifics were added to the language so it was even harder for

folks like Mike Bob and Jim to pull one over on Ma and Pa Kettle, so yeah you

know it's a Billy Joel famously saying 'It's just a matter of trust'.... [Man in club singing]

ask your parents