The persistent attempts of the Standard to disregard this order increased its reputation for lawlessness.Finally, in 1899, after Ohio had brought another action, the trust was dissolved.The Standard interests now reorganized all their holdings under the name of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey.Again, in 1911, the United States Supreme Court declared this combination a violation of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, and ordered its dissolution.By this time the Standard capitalists had learned the value of public opinion as a corporate asset, and made no attempt to evade the order of the court.The Standard Oil Company of New Jersey proceeded to apportion among its stockholders the stock which it held in thirty-seven other companies--refineries, pipe lines, producing companies, marketing companies, and the like.Chief Justice White, in rendering his decision, specifically ordered that, in dissolving their combination, the Standard should make no agreement, contractual or implied, which was intended still to retain their properties in one ownership.
As less than a dozen men owned a majority interest in the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, these same men naturally continued to own a majority interest in the subsidiary companies.
Though the immediate effect of this famous decision therefore was not to cause a separation in fact, this does not signify that, as time goes on, such a real dissolution will not take place.It is not unlikely that, in a few years, the transfers of the stock by inheritance or sale will weaken the consolidated interest to a point where the companies that made up the Standard Company will be distinct and competitive.
This is more likely to be the case since, long before the decision of 1911, the Standard Oil Company had ceased to be a monopoly.In the early nineties there came to the front in the oil regions a man whose organizing ability and indomitable will suggested the Standard Oil leaders themselves.This man's soul burned with an intense hatred of the Rockefeller group, and this sentiment, as much as his love of success, inspired all his efforts.There is nothing finer in American business history than the fifteen years' battle which Lewis Emery, Jr., fought against the greatest financial power of the day.In 1901 this long struggle met with complete success.Its monuments were the two great trunk pipe lines which Emery had built from the Pennsylvania regions to Marcus Hook, near Philadelphia, one for pumping refined and one for pumping crude.The Pure Oil Company, Emery's creation, has survived all its trials and has done an excellent business.And meanwhile other independents sprang up with the discovery of oil in other parts of the country.This discovery first astonished the Standard Oil men themselves; when someone suggested to Archbold, thirty-five years ago, that the midcontinent field probably contained large oil supplies, he laughed, and said that he would drink all the oil ever discovered outside of Pennsylvania.In these days a haunting fear pursued the oil men that the Pennsylvania field would be exhausted and that their business would be ended.This fear, as developments showed, had a substantial basis; the Pennsylvania yield began to fail in the eighties and nineties, until now it is an inconsiderable element in this gigantic industry.Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, California, and other states in turn became the scene of the same exciting and adventurous events that had followed the discovery of oil in Pennsylvania.
The Standard promptly extended its pipe lines into these new areas, but other great companies also took part in the development.These companies, such as the Gulf Refining Company and the Texas Refining Company, have their gathering pipe lines, their great trunk lines, their marketing stations, and their export trade, like the Standard; the Pure Oil Company has its tank cars, its tank ships, and its barges on the great rivers of Europe.The ending of the rebate system has stimulated the growth of independents, and the production of crude oil and the market demand in a thousand directions has increased the business to an extent which is now far beyond the ability of any one corporation to monopolize.The Standard interests refine perhaps something more than fifty per cent of the crude oil produced in this country.But in recent years, Standard Oil has meant more than a corporation dealing in this natural product.It has become the synonym of a vast financial power reaching in all directions.The enormous profits made by the Rockefeller group have found investments in other fields.The Rockefellers became the owners of the great Mesaba iron ore range in Minnesota and of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, the chief competitor of United States Steel.It is the largest factor in several of the greatest American banks.Above all, it is the single largest railroad power in America today.
