U. S. v. PHILADELPHIA NAT. BANK

MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN delivered the opinion of the Court.

The United States, appellant here, brought this civil action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania under § 4 of the Sherman Act, 15 U. S. C. § 4, and § 15 of the Clayton Act, 15 U. S. C. § 25, to enjoin a proposed merger of The Philadelphia National Bank (PNB) and Girard Trust Corn Exchange Bank (Girard), appellees here. The complaint charged violations of § 1 of the Sherman Act, 15 U. S. C. § 1, and § 7 of the Clayton Act, 15 U. S. C. § 18.1 From a judgment for appellees after trial, see 201 F.Supp. 348, the United States appealed to this Court under § 2 of the Expediting Act, 15 U. S. C. § 29. Probable jurisdiction was noted. 369 U.S. 883. We reverse the judgment of the District Court. We hold that the merger of appellees is forbidden by § 7 of the Clayton Act and so must be enjoined; we need not, and therefore do not, reach the further question of alleged violation of § 1 of the Sherman Act.

I. THE FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS BELOW.

A. The Background: Commercial Banking in the United States.

Because this is the first case which has required this Court to consider the application of the antitrust laws to the commercial banking industry, and because aspects of the industry and of the degree of governmental regulation of it will recur throughout our discussion, we deem it appropriate to begin with a brief background description.2

Commercial banking in this country is primarily unit banking. That is, control of commercial banking is diffused throughout a very large number of independent, local banks—13,460 of them in 1960—rather than concentrated in a handful of nationwide banks, as, for example, in England and Germany. There are, to be sure, in addition to the independent banks, some 10,000 branch banks; but branching, which is controlled largely by state law—and prohibited altogether by some States—enables a bank to extend itself only to state lines and often not that far.3 It is also the case, of course, that many banks place loans and solicit deposits outside their home area. But with these qualifications, it remains true that ours is essentially a decentralized system of community banks. Recent years, however, have witnessed a definite trend toward concentration. Thus, during the decade ending in 1960 the number of commercial banks in the United States declined by 714, despite the chartering of 887 new banks and a very substantial increase in the Nation's credit needs during the period. Of the 1,601 independent banks which thus disappeared, 1,503, with combined total resources of well over $25,000,000,000, disappeared as the result of mergers.

Commercial banks are unique among financial institutions in that they alone are permitted by law to accept demand deposits. This distinctive power gives commercial banking a key role in the national economy. For banks do not merely deal in, but are actually a source of, money and credit; when a bank makes a loan by crediting the borrower's demand deposit account, it augments the Nation's credit supply.4 Furthermore, the power to accept demand deposits makes banks the intermediaries in most financial transactions (since transfers of substantial moneys are almost always by check rather than by cash) and, concomitantly, the repositories of very substantial individual and corporate funds. The banks' use of these funds is conditioned by the fact that their working capital consists very largely of demand deposits, which makes liquidity the guiding principle of bank lending and investing policies; thus it is that banks are the chief source of the country's short-term business credit.

Banking operations are varied and complex; "commercial banking" describes a congeries of services and credit devices.5 But among them the creation of additional money and credit, the management of the checkingaccount system, and the furnishing of short-term business loans would appear to be the most important. For the proper discharge of these functions is indispensable to a healthy national economy, as the role of bank failures in depression periods attests. It is therefore not surprising that commercial banking in the United States is subject to a variety of governmental controls, state and federal. Federal regulation is the more extensive, and our focus will be upon it. It extends not only to the national banks, i. e., banks chartered under federal law and supervised by the Comptroller of the Currency, see 12 U. S. C. § 21 et seq. For many state banks, see 12 U. S. C. § 321, as well as virtually all the national banks, 12 U. S. C. § 222, are members of the Federal Reserve System (FRS), and more than 95% of all banks, see 12 U. S. C. § 1815, are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). State member and nonmember insured banks are subject to a federal regulatory scheme almost as elaborate as that which governs the national banks.

The governmental controls of American banking are manifold. First, the Federal Reserve System, through its open-market operations, see 12 U. S. C. §§ 263 (c), 353-359, control of the rediscount rate, see 12 U. S. C. § 357, and modifications of reserve requirements, see 12 U. S. C. §§ 462, 462b, regulates the supply of money and credit in the economy and thereby indirectly regulates the interest rates of bank loans. This is not, however, rate regulation. The Reserve System's activities are only designed to influence the prime, i. e., minimum, bank interest rate. There is no federal control of the maximum, although all banks, state and national, are subject to state usury laws where applicable. See 12 U. S. C. § 85. In the range between the maximum fixed by state usury laws and the practical minimum set by federal fiscal policies (there is no law against undercutting the prime rate but bankers seldom do), bankers are free to price their loans as they choose. Moreover, charges for other banking services, such as service charges for checking privileges, are free of governmental regulation, state or federal.

Entry, branching, and acquisitions are covered by a network of state and federal statutes. A charter for a new bank, state or national, will not be granted unless the invested capital and management of the applicant, and its prospects for doing sufficient business to operate at a reasonable profit, give adequate protection against undue competition and possible failure. See, e. g., 12 U. S. C. §§ 26, 27, 51; 12 CFR § 4.1 (b); Pa. Stat. Ann., Tit. 7, § 819-306. Failure to meet these standards may cause the FDIC to refuse an application for insurance, 12 U. S. C. §§ 1815, 1816, and may cause the FDIC, Federal Reserve Board (FRB), and Comptroller to refuse permission to branch to insured, member, and national banks, respectively. 12 U. S. C. §§ 36, 321, 1828 (d). Permission to merge, consolidate, acquire assets, or assume liabilities may be refused by the agencies on the same grounds. 12 U. S. C. (1958 ed., Supp. IV) § 1828 (c), note 8, infra. Furthermore, national banks appear to be subject to state geographical limitations on branching. See 12 U. S. C. § 36 (c).

Banks are also subject to a number of specific provisions aimed at ensuring sound banking practices. For example, member banks of the Federal Reserve System may not pay interest on demand deposits, 12 U. S. C. § 371a, may not invest in common stocks or hold for their own account investment securities of any one obligor in excess of 10% of the bank's unimpaired capital and surplus, see 12 U. S. C. §§ 24 Seventh, 335, and may not pay interest on time or savings deposits above the rate fixed by the FRB, 12 U. S. C. § 371b. The payment of interest on deposits by nonmember insured banks is also federally regulated. 12 U. S. C. (1958 ed., Supp. IV) § 1828 (g); 12 CFR, 1962 Supp., Part 329. In the case of national banks, the 10% limit on the obligations of a single obligor includes loans as well as investment securities. See 12 U. S. C. § 84. Pennsylvania imposes the same limitation upon banks chartered under its laws, such as Girard. Pa. Stat. Ann. (1961 Supp.), Tit. 7, § 819-1006.

But perhaps the most effective weapon of federal regulation of banking is the broad visitatorial power of federal bank examiners. Whenever the agencies deem it necessary, they may order "a thorough examination of all the affairs of the bank," whether it be a member of the FRS or a nonmember insured bank. 12 U. S. C. §§ 325, 481, 483, 1820 (b); 12 CFR § 4.2. Such examinations are frequent and intensive. In addition, the banks are required to furnish detailed periodic reports of their operations to the supervisory agencies. 12 U. S. C. §§ 161, 324, 1820 (e). In this way the agencies maintain virtually a day-to-day surveillance of the American banking system. And should they discover unsound banking practices, they are equipped with a formidable array of sanctions. If in the judgment of the FRB a member bank is making "undue use of bank credit," the Board may suspend the bank from the use of the credit facilities of the FRS. 12 U. S. C. § 301. The FDIC has an even more formidable power. If it finds "unsafe or unsound practices" in the conduct of the business of any insured bank, it may terminate the bank's insured status. 12 U. S. C. § 1818 (a). Such involuntary termination severs the bank's membership in the FRS, if it is a state bank, and throws it into receivership if it is a national bank. 12 U. S. C. § 1818 (b). Lesser, but nevertheless drastic, sanctions include publication of the results of bank examinations. 12 U. S. C. §§ 481, 1828 (f). As a result of the existence of this panoply of sanctions, recommendations by the agencies concerning banking practices tend to be followed by bankers without the necessity of formal compliance proceedings. 1 Davis, Administrative Law (1958), § 4.04.

Federal supervision of banking has been called "[p]robably the outstanding example in the federal government of regulation of an entire industry through methods of supervision . . . . The system may be one of the most successful [systems of economic regulation], if not the most successful." Id., § 4.04, at 247. To the efficacy of this system we may owe, in part, the virtual disappearance of bank failures from the American economic scene.6

B. The Proposed Merger of PNB and Girard.

The Philadelphia National Bank and Girard Trust Corn Exchange Bank are, respectively, the second and third largest of the 42 commercial banks with head offices in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, which consists of the City of Philadelphia and its three contiguous counties in Pennsylvania. The home county of both banks is the city itself; Pennsylvania law, however, permits branching into the counties contiguous to the home county, Pa. Stat. Ann. (1961 Supp.), Tit. 7, § 819-204.1, and both banks have offices throughout the four-county area. PNB, a national bank, has assets of over $1,000,000,000, making it (as of 1959) the twenty-first largest bank in the Nation. Girard, a state bank, is a member of the FRS and is insured by the FDIC; it has assets of about $750,000,000. Were the proposed merger to be consummated, the resulting bank would be the largest in the four-county area, with (approximately) 36% of the area banks' total assets, 36% of deposits, and 34% of net loans. It and the second largest (First Pennsylvania Bank and Trust Company, now the largest) would have between them 59% of the total assets, 58% of deposits, and 58% of the net loans, while after the merger the four largest banks in the area would have 78% of total assets, 77% of deposits, and 78% of net loans.

The present size of both PNB and Girard is in part the result of mergers. Indeed, the trend toward concentration is noticeable in the Philadelphia area generally, in which the number of commercial banks has declined from 108 in 1947 to the present 42. Since 1950, PNB has acquired nine formerly independent banks and Girard six; and these acquisitions have accounted for 59% and 85% of the respective banks' asset growth during the period, 63% and 91% of their deposit growth, and 12% and 37% of their loan growth. During this period, the seven largest banks in the area increased their combined share of the area's total commercial bank resources from about 61% to about 90%.

In November 1960 the boards of directors of the two banks approved a proposed agreement for their consolidation under the PNB charter. By the terms of the agreement, PNB's stockholders were to retain their share certificates, which would be deemed to represent an equal number of shares in the consolidated bank, while Girard's stockholders would surrender their shares in exchange for shares in the consolidated bank, receiving 1.2875 such shares for each Girard share. Such a consolidation is authorized, subject to the approval of the Comptroller of the Currency, by 12 U. S. C. (1958 ed., Supp. IV) § 215.7 But under the Bank Merger Act of 1960, 12 U. S. C. (1963 ed., Supp. IV) § 1828 (c), the Comptroller may not give his approval until he has received reports from the other two banking agencies and the Attorney General respecting the probable effects of the proposed transaction on competition.8 All three reports advised that the proposed merger would have substantial anticompetitive effects in the Philadelphia metropolitan area. However, on February 24, 1961, the Comptroller approved the merger. No opinion was rendered at that time. But as required by § 1828 (c), the Comptroller explained the basis for his decision to approve the merger in a statement to be included in his annual report to Congress. As to effect upon competition, he reasoned that "[s]ince there will remain an adequate number of alternative sources of banking service in Philadelphia, and in view of the beneficial effects of this consolidation upon international and national competition it was concluded that the over-all effect upon competition would not be unfavorable." He also stated that the consolidated bank "would be far better able to serve the convenience and needs of its community by being of material assistance to its city and state in their efforts to attract new industry and to retain existing industry." The day after the Comptroller approved the merger, the United States commenced the present action. No steps have been taken to consummate the merger pending the outcome of this litigation.

C. The Trial and the District Court's Decision.

The Government's case in the District Court relied chiefly on statistical evidence bearing upon market structure and on testimony by economists and bankers to the effect that, notwithstanding the intensive governmental regulation of banking, there was a substantial area for the free play of competitive forces; that concentration of commercial banking, which the proposed merger would increase, was inimical to that free play; that the principal anticompetitive effect of the merger would be felt in the area in which the banks had their offices, thus making the four-county metropolitan area the relevant geographical market; and that commercial banking was the relevant product market. The defendants, in addition to offering contrary evidence on these points, attempted to show business justifications for the merger. They conceded that both banks were economically strong and had sound management, but offered the testimony of bankers to show that the resulting bank, with its greater prestige and increased lending limit,9 would be better able to compete with large out-of-state (particularly New York) banks, would attract new business to Philadelphia, and in general would promote the economic development of the metropolitan area.10

Upon this record, the District Court held that: (1) the passage of the Bank Merger Act of 1960 did not repeal by implication the antitrust laws insofar as they may apply to bank mergers; (2) § 7 of the Clayton Act is inapplicable to bank mergers because banks are not corporations "subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission"; (3) but assuming that § 7 is applicable, the four-county Philadelphia metropolitan area is not the relevant geographical market because PNB and Girard actively compete with other banks for bank business throughout the greater part of the northeastern United States; (4) but even assuming that § 7 is applicable and that the four-county area is the relevant market, there is no reasonable probability that competition among commercial banks in the area will be substantially lessened as the result of the merger; (5) since the merger does not violate § 7 of the Clayton Act, a fortiori it does not violate § 1 of the Sherman Act; (6) the merger will benefit the Philadelphia metropolitan area economically. The District Court also ruled that for the purposes of § 7, commercial banking is a line of commerce; the appellees do not contest this ruling.

II. THE APPLICABILITY OF SECTION 7 OF THE CLAYTON ACT TO BANK MERGERS.

A. The Original Section and the 1950 Amendment.

By its terms, the present § 7 reaches acquisitions of corporate stock or share capital by any corporation engaged in commerce, but it reaches acquisitions of corporate assets only by corporations "subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission." The FTC, under § 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, has no jurisdiction over banks. 15 U. S. C. § 45 (a) (6).11 Therefore, if the proposed merger be deemed an assets acquisition, it is not within § 7.12 Appellant argues vigorously that a merger is crucially different from a pure assets acquisition,13 and appellees argue with equal vigor that it is crucially different from a pure stock acquisition.14 Both positions, we think, have merit; a merger fits neither category neatly. Since the literal terms of § 7 thus do not dispose of our question, we must determine whether a congressional design to embrace bank mergers is revealed in the history of the statute. The question appears to be one of first impression; we have been directed to no previous case in which a merger or consolidation was challenged under § 7 of the Clayton Act, as amended, where the acquiring corporation was not subject to the FTC's jurisdiction.

When it was first enacted in 1914, § 7 referred only to corporate acquisitions of stock and share capital; it was silent as to assets acquisitions and as to mergers and consolidations. Act of October 15, 1914, c. 323, § 7, 38 Stat. 731-732, note 18, infra. It is true that the omission may not have been an oversight. Congress' principal concern was with the activities of holding companies, and specifically with the practice whereby corporations secretly acquired control of their competitors by purchasing the stock of those companies. Although assets acquisitions and mergers were known forms of corporate amalgamation at the time, their no less dangerously anticompetitive effects may not have been fully apparent to the Congress.15 Still, the statutory language, read in the light of the overriding congressional purpose to control corporate concentrations tending to monopoly, lent itself to a construction whereby § 7 would have reached at least mergers and consolidations. It would hardly have done violence to the language so to have interpreted the vague term "share capital," see 30 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 1024, 1027-1028 (1962), or to have adopted the view that: "where the assets are exchanged for the stock of the purchasing company, assuming that the two companies were previously in competition, it is apparent that the seller has acquired stock in a competing company . . . [and] therefore, that in effecting the merger section 7 was violated and hence the distribution of the stock received by the selling company to its shareholders and its subsequent dissolution are no bar to proceedings by the government to set aside the purchase." Handler, Industrial Mergers and the Anti-Trust Laws, 32 Col. L. Rev. 179, 266 (1932).16

But the courts found mergers to be beyond the reach of § 7, even when the merger technique had supplanted stock acquisitions as the prevalent mode of corporate amalgamation. United States v. Celanese Corp. of America, 91 F.Supp. 14 (D. C. S. D. N. Y. 1950); see Thatcher Mfg. Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n and Swift & Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, decided together with Federal Trade Comm'n v. Western Meat Co., 272 U.S. 554; Arrow-Hart & Hegeman Elec. Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, 291 U.S. 587.17 As a result, § 7 became largely a dead letter. Comment, 68 Yale L. J. 1627, 1629-1630 (1959); see Federal Trade Commission, The Merger Movement: A Summary Report (1948), 1, 3-6; Henderson, The Federal Trade Commission (1924), 40. Meanwhile, this Court's decision in United States v. Columbia Steel Co., 334 U.S. 495, stirred concern whether the Sherman Act alone was a check against corporate acquisitions. Note, 52 Col. L. Rev. 766, 768 (1952).

It was against this background that Congress in 1950 amended § 7 to include an assets-acquisition provision. Act of December 29, 1950 (Celler-Kefauver Antimerger Act), c. 1184, 64 Stat. 1125-1126, 15 U. S. C. § 18.18 The legislative history is silent on the specific questions why the amendment made no explicit reference to mergers, why assets acquisitions by corporations not subject to FTC jurisdiction were not included, and what these omissions signify. Nevertheless, the basic congressional design clearly emerges and from that design the answers to these questions may be inferred. Congress primarily sought to bring mergers within § 7 and thereby close what it regarded as a loophole in the section.19 But, in addition, it sought to reach transactions such as that involved in Columbia Steel, which was a simple purchase of assets and not a merger.20 In other words, Congress contemplated that the 1950 amendment would give § 7 a reach which would bring the entire range of corporate amalgamations, from pure stock acquisitions to pure assets acquisitions, within the scope of § 7. Thus, the stock-acquisition and assets-acquisition provisions, read together, reach mergers, which fit neither category perfectly but lie somewhere between the two ends of the spectrum. See pp. 336-337, and notes 13, 14, supra. So construed, the specific exception for acquiring corporations not subject to the FTC's jurisdiction excludes from the coverage of § 7 only assets acquisitions by such corporations when not accomplished by merger.

This construction is supported by a number of specific considerations.

First. Any other construction would be illogical and disrespectful of the plain congressional purpose in amending § 7, because it would create a large loophole in a statute designed to close a loophole. It is unquestioned that the stock-acquisition provision of § 7 embraces every corporation engaged in commerce, including banks. And it is plain that Congress, in amending § 7, considered a distinction for antitrust purposes between acquisition of corporate control by purchase of stock and acquisition by merger unsupportable in reason, and sought to overrule the decisions of this Court which had recognized such a distinction.21 If, therefore, mergers in industries outside the FTC's jurisdiction were deemed beyond the reach of § 7, the result would be precisely that difference in treatment which Congress rejected. On the other hand, excluding from the section assets acquisitions not by merger in those industries does not appear to create a lacuna of practical importance.22

Second. The Congress which debated the bill to amend § 7 was fully aware of the important differences between a merger and a pure purchase of assets. For example, Senator Kilgore remarked:

Plainly, acquisition of "assets" as used in amended § 7 was not meant to be a simple equivalent of acquisition by merger, but was intended rather to ensure against the blunting of the antimerger thrust of the section by evasive transactions such as had rendered the original section ineffectual. Thus, the stock-acquisition provision of § 7, though reenacted in haec verba by the 1950 amendment, must be deemed expanded in its new context to include, at the very least, acquisitions by merger or consolidation, transactions which entail a transfer of stock of the parties, while the assets-acquisition provision clearly reaches corporate acquisitions involving no such transfer. And see note 22, supra. This seems to be the point of Congressman Patman's remark, typical of many, that: "What this bill does is to put all corporate mergers on the same footing, whether the result of the acquisitions of stock or the acquisition of physical assets." Hearings, supra, at 126. To the same effect is the House Report on the bill to amend § 7: "The bill retains language of the present statute which is broad enough to prevent evasion of the central purpose. It covers not only purchase of assets or stock but also any other method of acquisition . . . . It forbids not only direct acquisitions but also indirect acquisitions . . . ." H. R. Rep. No. 1191, 81st Cong., 1st Sess. 8-9.

Third. The legislative history shows that the objective of including the phrase "corporation subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission" in § 7 was not to limit the amalgamations to be covered by the amended statute but to make explicit the role of the FTC in administering the section. The predominant focus of the hearings, debates, and committee reports was upon the powers of the FTC. The decisions of this Court which had uncovered the loophole in the original § 7—Thatcher, Swift, and Arrow-Hart—had not rested directly upon the substantive coverage of § 7, but rather upon the limited scope of the FTC's divestiture powers under § 11. See note 17, supra. There were intimations that the courts' power to enforce § 7 might be far greater. See Thatcher Mfg. Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, supra, at 561; Swift & Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, supra, at 563; Federal Trade Comm'n v. Eastman Kodak Co., 274 U.S. 619, 624; Arrow-Hart & Hegeman Elec. Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, supra, at 598-599; Irvine, The Uncertainties of Section 7 of the Clayton Act, 14 Cornell L. Q. 28 (1928). Thus, the loophole was sometimes viewed as primarily a gap in the FTC's jurisdiction.23 Furthermore, although the Clayton Act has always provided for dual enforcement by court and agency, see 15 U. S. C. § 25; United States v. W. T. Grant Co., 345 U.S. 629; United States Alkali Export Assn. v. United States, 325 U.S. 196, 208, prior to the 1950 amendment enforcement of § 7 was left largely to the FTC. Martin, Mergers and the Clayton Act (1959), 205, 219; Montague, The Celler Anti-Merger Act: An Administrative Problem in an Economic Crisis, 37 A. B. A. J. 253 (1951). And the impetus to amend § 7 came in large part from the FTC. See, e. g., Martin, supra, 187-194; Federal Trade Commission, Annual Reports, 1928, pp. 18-19; 1940, pp. 12-13; 1948, pp. 11-12; The Merger Movement: A Summary Report (1948). Congress in 1950 clearly intended to remove all question concerning the FTC's remedial power over corporate acquisitions, and therefore explicitly enlarged the FTC's jurisdiction. Congress' choice of this means of underscoring the FTC's role in enforcing § 7 provides no basis for a construction which would undercut the dominant congressional purpose of eliminating the difference in treatment accorded stock acquisitions and mergers by the original § 7 as construed.

Fourth. It is settled law that "[i]mmunity from the antitrust laws is not lightly implied." California v. Federal Power Comm'n, 369 U.S. 482, 485. Cf. United States v. Borden Co., 308 U.S. 188, 198-199; United States v. Southern Pac. Co., 259 U.S. 214, 239-240. This canon of construction, which reflects the felt indispensable role of antitrust policy in the maintenance of a free economy, is controlling here. For there is no indication in the legislative history to the 1950 amendment of § 7 that Congress wished to confer a special dispensation upon the banking industry; if Congress had so wished, moreover, surely it would have exempted the industry from the stock-acquisition as well as the assets-acquisition provision.

Of course, our construction of the amended § 7 is not foreclosed because, after the passage of the amendment, some members of Congress, and for a time the Justice Department, voiced the view that bank mergers were still beyond the reach of the section.24 "[T]he views of a subsequent Congress form a hazardous basis for inferring the intent of an earlier one." United States v. Price, 361 U.S. 304, 313; see Rainwater v. United States, 356 U.S. 590, 593; United States v. United Mine Workers, 330 U.S. 258, 282; cf. United States v. E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 353 U.S. 586, 590. This holds true even though misunderstanding of the scope of § 7 may have played some part in the passage of the Bank Merger Act of 1960.25 There is a question, to which we shall shortly turn, whether there exists such inconsistency between the Bank Merger Act and § 7, as we now construe it, as to require a holding that § 7 must be deemed repealed pro tanto; but that is a different question from whether misunderstanding of the scope of § 7 is relevant to our task of defining what scope Congress gave the section in 1950. When Congress enacted the Bank Merger Act, the applicability of § 7 to bank mergers was still to be authoritatively determined; it was a subject of speculation. Thus, this is not a case in which our "earlier decisions are part of the arch on which the new structure rests, [and] we [must] refrain from disturbing them lest we change the design that Congress fashioned." State Board of Ins. v. Todd Shipyards Corp., 370 U.S. 451, 458. Cf. note 17, supra. The design fashioned in the Bank Merger Act was predicated upon uncertainty as to the scope of § 7, and we do no violence to that design by dispelling the uncertainty.

B. The Effect of the Bank Merger Act of 1960.

Appellees contended below that the Bank Merger Act, by directing the banking agencies to consider competitive factors before approving mergers, 12 U. S. C. (1958 ed., Supp. IV) § 1828 (c), note 8, supra, immunizes approved mergers from challenge under the federal antitrust laws.26 We think the District Court was correct in rejecting this contention. No express immunity is conferred by the Act.27 Repeals of the antitrust laws by implication from a regulatory statute are strongly disfavored,28 and have only been found in cases of plain repugnancy between the antitrust and regulatory provisions.29 Two recent cases, Pan American World Airways v. United States, 371 U.S. 296, and California v. Federal Power Comm'n, 369 U.S. 482, illustrate this principle. In Pan American, the Court held that because the Civil Aeronautics Board had been given broad powers to enforce the competitive standard clearly delineated by the Civil Aeronautics Act, and to immunize a variety of transactions from the operation of the antitrust laws, the Sherman Act could not be applied to facts composing the precise ingredients of a case subject to the Board's broad regulatory and remedial powers; in contrast, the banking agencies have authority neither to enforce the antitrust laws against mergers, cf. note 22, supra, nor to grant immunity from those laws.

In the California case, on the other hand, the Court held that the FPC's approval of a merger did not confer immunity from § 7 of the Clayton Act, even though, as in the instant case, the agency had taken the competitive factor into account in passing upon the merger application. See 369 U. S., at 484-485, 487-488. We think California is controlling here. Although the Comptroller was required to consider effect upon competition in passing upon appellees' merger application, he was not required to give this factor any particular weight; he was not even required to (and did not) hold a hearing before approving the application; and there is no specific provision for judicial review of his decision.30 Plainly, the range and scope of administrative powers under the Bank Merger Act bear little resemblance to those involved in Pan American.

Nor did Congress, in passing the Bank Merger Act, embrace the view that federal regulation of banking is so comprehensive that enforcement of the antitrust laws would be either unnecessary, in light of the completeness of the regulatory structure, or disruptive of that structure. On the contrary, the legislative history of the Act seems clearly to refute any suggestion that applicability of the antitrust laws was to be affected. Both the House and Senate Committee Reports stated that the Act would not affect in any way the applicability of the antitrust laws to bank acquisitions. H. R. Rep. No. 1416, 86th Cong., 2d Sess. 9; S. Rep. No. 196, 86th Cong., 1st Sess. 3. See also, e. g., 105 Cong. Rec. 8131 (remarks of Senator Robertson, the Act's sponsor). Moreover, bank regulation is in most respects less complete than public utility regulation, to which interstate rail and air carriers, among others, are subject. Rate regulation in the banking industry is limited and largely indirect, see p. 328, supra; banks are under no duty not to discriminate in their services; and though the location of bank offices is regulated, banks may do business—place loans and solicit deposits—where they please. The fact that the banking agencies maintain a close surveillance of the industry with a view toward preventing unsound practices that might impair liquidity or lead to insolvency does not make federal banking regulation all-pervasive, although it does minimize the hazards of intense competition. Indeed, that there are so many direct public controls over unsound competitive practices in the industry refutes the argument that private controls of competition are necessary in the public interest and ought therefore to be immune from scrutiny under the antitrust laws. Cf. Kaysen and Turner, Antitrust Policy (1959), 206.

We note, finally, that the doctrine of "primary jurisdiction" is not applicable here. That doctrine requires judicial abstention in cases where protection of the integrity of a regulatory scheme dictates preliminary resort to the agency which administers the scheme. See Far East Conference v. United States, 342 U.S. 570; Great Northern R. Co. v. Merchants Elevator Co., 259 U.S. 285; Schwartz, Legal Restriction of Competition in the Regulated Industries: An Abdication of Judicial Responsibility, 67 Harv. L. Rev. 436, 464 (1954).31 Court jurisdiction is not thereby ousted, but only postponed. See General Am. Tank Car Corp. v. El Dorado Terminal Co., 308 U.S. 422, 433; Federal Maritime Bd. v. Isbrandtsen Co., 356 U.S. 481, 498-499; 3 Davis, Administrative Law (1958), 1-55. Thus, even if we were to assume the applicability of the doctrine to merger-application proceedings before the banking agencies,32 the present action would not be barred, for the agency proceeding was completed before the antitrust action was commenced. Cf. United States v. Western Pac. R. Co., 352 U.S. 59, 69; Retail Clerks Int'l Assn. v. Schermerhorn, 373 U.S. 746, 756. We recognize that the practical effect of applying the doctrine of primary jurisdiction has sometimes been to channel judicial enforcement of antitrust policy into appellate review of the agency's decision, see Federal Maritime Bd. v. Isbrandtsen Co., supra; cf. D. L. Piazza Co. v. West Coast Line, Inc., 210 F.2d 947 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1954), or even to preclude such enforcement entirely if the agency has the power to approve the challenged activities, see United States Nav. Co. v. Cunard S. S. Co., 284 U.S. 474; cf. United States v. Railway Express Agency, 101 F.Supp. 1008 (D. C. D. Del. 1951); but see Federal Maritime Bd. v. Isbrandtsen Co., supra. But here there may be no power of judicial review of the administrative decision approving the merger, and such approval does not in any event confer immunity from the antitrust laws, see pp. 350-352, supra. Furthermore, the considerations that militate against finding a repeal of the antitrust laws by implication from the existence of a regulatory scheme also argue persuasively against attenuating, by postponing, the courts' jurisdiction to enforce those laws.

It should be unnecessary to add that in holding as we do that the Bank Merger Act of 1960 does not preclude application of § 7 of the Clayton Act to bank mergers, we deprive the later statute of none of its intended force. Congress plainly did not intend the 1960 Act to extinguish other sources of federal restraint of bank acquisitions having anticompetitive effects. For example, Congress certainly knew that bank mergers would continue subject to the Sherman Act, see p. 352, supra, as well as that pure stock acquisitions by banks would continue subject to § 7 of the Clayton Act. If, in addition, bank mergers are subject to § 7, we do not see how the objectives of the 1960 Act are thereby thwarted. It is not as if the Clayton and Sherman Acts embodied approaches to antitrust policy inconsistent with or unrelated to each other. The Sherman Act, of course, forbids mergers effecting an unreasonable restraint of trade. See, e. g., Northern Securities Co. v. United States, 193 U.S. 197; United States v. Union Pac. R. Co., 226 U.S. 61; indeed, there is presently pending before this Court a challenge to a bank merger predicated solely on the Sherman Act. United States v. First Nat. Bank & Trust Co. of Lexington, prob. juris. noted, post, p. 824. And the tests of illegality under the Sherman and Clayton Acts are complementary. "[T]he public policy announced by § 7 of the Clayton Act is to be taken into consideration in determining whether acquisition of assets . . . violates the prohibitions of the Sherman Act against unreasonable restraints." United States v. Columbia Steel Co., 334 U.S. 495, 507, n. 7; see Note, 52 Col. L. Rev. 766, 768, n. 10 (1952). To be sure, not every violation of § 7, as amended, would necessarily be a violation of the Sherman Act; our point is simply that since Congress passed the 1960 Act with no intention of displacing the enforcement of the Sherman Act against bank mergers—or even of § 7 against pure stock acquisitions by banks—continued application of § 7 to bank mergers cannot be repugnant to the design of the 1960 Act. It would be anomalous to conclude that Congress, while intending the Sherman Act to remain fully applicable to bank mergers, and § 7 of the Clayton Act to remain fully applicable to pure stock acquisitions by banks, nevertheless intended § 7 to be completely inapplicable to bank mergers.

III. THE LAWFULNESS OF THE PROPOSED MERGER UNDER SECTION 7.

The statutory test is whether the effect of the merger "may be substantially to lessen competition" "in any line of commerce in any section of the country." We analyzed the test in detail in Brown Shoe Co. v. United States, 370 U.S. 294, and that analysis need not be repeated or extended here, for the instant case presents only a straightforward problem of application to particular facts.

We have no difficulty in determining the "line of commerce" (relevant product or services market) and "section of the country" (relevant geographical market) in which to appraise the probable competitive effects of appellees' proposed merger. We agree with the District Court that the cluster of products (various kinds of credit) and services (such as checking accounts and trust administration) denoted by the term "commercial banking," see note 5, supra, composes a distinct line of commerce. Some commercial banking products or services are so distinctive that they are entirely free of effective competition from products or services of other financial institutions; the checking account is in this category. Others enjoy such cost advantages as to be insulated within a broad range from substitutes furnished by other institutions. For example, commercial banks compete with small-loan companies in the personal-loan market; but the small-loan companies' rates are invariably much higher than the banks', in part, it seems, because the companies' working capital consists in substantial part of bank loans.33 Finally, there are banking facilities which, although in terms of cost and price they are freely competitive with the facilities provided by other financial institutions, nevertheless enjoy a settled consumer preference, insulating them, to a marked degree, from competition; this seems to be the case with savings deposits.34 In sum, it is clear that commercial banking is a market "sufficiently inclusive to be meaningful in terms of trade realities." Crown Zellerbach Corp. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, 296 F.2d 800, 811 (C. A. 9th Cir. 1961).

We part company with the District Court on the determination of the appropriate "section of the country." The proper question to be asked in this case is not where the parties to the merger do business or even where they compete, but where, within the area of competitive overlap, the effect of the merger on competition will be direct and immediate. See Bock, Mergers and Markets (1960), 42. This depends upon "the geographic structure of supplier-customer relations." Kaysen and Turner, Anti-trust Policy (1959), 102. In banking, as in most service industries, convenience of location is essential to effective competition. Individuals and corporations typically confer the bulk of their patronage on banks in their local community; they find it impractical to conduct their banking business at a distance.35 See Transamerica Corp. v. Board of Govs. of Fed. Res. Sys., 206 F.2d 163, 169 (C. A. 3d Cir. 1953). The factor of inconvenience localizes banking competition as effectively as high transportation costs in other industries. See, e. g., American Crystal Sugar Co. v. Cuban-American Sugar Co., 152 F.Supp. 387, 398 (D. C. S. D. N. Y. 1957), aff'd, 259 F.2d 524 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1958). Therefore, since, as we recently said in a related context, the "area of effective competition in the known line of commerce must be charted by careful selection of the market area in which the seller operates, and to which the purchaser can practicably turn for supplies," Tampa Elec. Co. v. Nashville Coal Co., 365 U.S. 320, 327 (emphasis supplied); see Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 337 U.S. 293, 299 and 300, n. 5, the four-county area in which appellees' offices are located would seem to be the relevant geographical market. Cf. Brown Shoe Co., supra, at 338-339. In fact, the vast bulk of appellees' business originates in the four-county area.36 Theoretically, we should be concerned with the possibility that bank offices on the perimeter of the area may be in effective competition with bank offices within; actually, this seems to be a factor of little significance.37

We recognize that the area in which appellees have their offices does not delineate with perfect accuracy an appropriate "section of the country" in which to appraise the effect of the merger upon competition. Large borrowers and large depositors, the record shows, may find it practical to do a large part of their banking business outside their home community; very small borrowers and depositors may, as a practical matter, be confined to bank offices in their immediate neighborhood; and customers of intermediate size, it would appear, deal with banks within an area intermediate between these extremes. See notes 35-37, supra. So also, some banking services are evidently more local in nature than others. But that in banking the relevant geographical market is a function of each separate customer's economic scale means simply that a workable compromise must be found: some fair intermediate delineation which avoids the indefensible extremes of drawing the market either so expansively as to make the effect of the merger upon competition seem insignificant, because only the very largest bank customers are taken into account in defining the market, or so narrowly as to place appellees in different markets, because only the smallest customers are considered. We think that the four-county Philadelphia metropolitan area, which state law apparently recognizes as a meaningful banking community in allowing Philadelphia banks to branch within it, and which would seem roughly to delineate the area in which bank customers that are neither very large nor very small find it practical to do their banking business, is a more appropriate "section of the country" in which to appraise the instant merger than any larger or smaller or different area. Cf. Hale and Hale, Market Power: Size and Shape Under the Sherman Act (1958), 119. We are helped to this conclusion by the fact that the three federal banking agencies regard the area in which banks have their offices as an "area of effective competition." Not only did the FDIC and FRB, in the reports they submitted to the Comptroller of the Currency in connection with appellees' application for permission to merge, so hold, but the Comptroller, in his statement approving the merger, agreed: "With respect to the effect upon competition, there are three separate levels and effective areas of competition involved. These are the national level for national accounts, the regional or sectional area, and the local area of the City of Philadelphia and the immediately surrounding area."

Having determined the relevant market, we come to the ultimate question under § 7: whether the effect of the merger "may be substantially to lessen competition" in the relevant market. Clearly, this is not the kind of question which is susceptible of a ready and precise answer in most cases. It requires not merely an appraisal of the immediate impact of the merger upon competition, but a prediction of its impact upon competitive conditions in the future; this is what is meant when it is said that the amended § 7 was intended to arrest anticompetitive tendencies in their "incipiency." See Brown Shoe Co., supra, at 317, 322. Such a prediction is sound only if it is based upon a firm understanding of the structure of the relevant market; yet the relevant economic data are both complex and elusive. See generally Bok, Section 7 of the Clayton Act and the Merging of Law and Economics, 74 Harv. L. Rev. 226 (1960). And unless businessmen can assess the legal consequences of a merger with some confidence, sound business planning is retarded. See Crown Zellerbach Corp. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, 296 F.2d 800, 826-827 (C. A. 9th Cir. 1961). So also, we must be alert to the danger of subverting congressional intent by permitting a too-broad economic investigation. Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 337 U.S. 293, 313. And so in any case in which it is possible, without doing violence to the congressional objective embodied in § 7, to simplify the test of illegality, the courts ought to do so in the interest of sound and practical judicial administration. See Union Carbide Corp., Trade Reg. Rep., FTC Complaints and Orders. 1961-1963, ¶ 15503, at 20375-20376 (concurring opinion). This is such a case.

We noted in Brown Shoe Co., supra, at 315, that "[t]he dominant theme pervading congressional consideration of the 1950 amendments [to § 7] was a fear of what was considered to be a rising tide of economic concentration in the American economy." This intense congressional concern with the trend toward concentration warrants dispensing, in certain cases, with elaborate proof of market structure, market behavior, or probable anticompetitive effects. Specifically, we think that a merger which produces a firm controlling an undue percentage share of the relevant market, and results in a significant increase in the concentration of firms in that market, is so inherently likely to lessen competition substantially that it must be enjoined in the absence of evidence clearly showing that the merger is not likely to have such anticompetitive effects. See United States v. Koppers Co., 202 F.Supp. 437 (D. C. W. D. Pa. 1962).

Such a test lightens the burden of proving illegality only with respect to mergers whose size makes them inherently suspect in light of Congress' design in § 7 to prevent undue concentration. Furthermore, the test is fully consonant with economic theory.38 That "[c]ompetition is likely to be greatest when there are many sellers, none of which has any significant market share,"39 is common ground among most economists, and was undoubtedly a premise of congressional reasoning about the antimerger statute.

The merger of appellees will result in a single bank's controlling at least 30% of the commercial banking business in the four-county Philadelphia metropolitan area.40 Without attempting to specify the smallest market share which would still be considered to threaten undue concentration, we are clear that 30% presents that threat.41 Further, whereas presently the two largest banks in the area (First Pennsylvania and PNB) control between them approximately 44% of the area's commercial banking business, the two largest after the merger (PNB-Girard and First Pennsylvania) will control 59%. Plainly, we think, this increase of more than 33% in concentration must be regarded as significant.42

Our conclusion that these percentages raise an inference that the effect of the contemplated merger of appellees may be substantially to lessen competition is not an arbitrary one, although neither the terms of § 7 nor the legislative history suggests that any particular percentage share was deemed critical. The House Report states that the tests of illegality under amended § 7 "are intended to be similar to those which the courts have applied in interpreting the same language as used in other sections of the Clayton Act." H. R. Rep. No. 1191, 81st Cong., 1st Sess. 8. Accordingly, we have relied upon decisions under these other sections in applying § 7. See Brown Shoe Co., supra, passim; cf. United States v. E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 353 U.S. 586, 595, and n. 15. In Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 337 U.S. 293, cited in S. Rep. No. 1775, 81st Cong., 2d Sess. 6, this Court held violative of § 3 of the Clayton Act exclusive contracts whereby the defendant company, which accounted for 23% of the sales in the relevant market and, together with six other firms, accounted for 65% of such sales, maintained control over outlets through which approximately 7% of the sales were made. In Federal Trade Comm'n v. Motion Picture Adv. Serv. Co., 344 U.S. 392, we held unlawful, under § 1 of the Sherman Act and § 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, rather than under § 3 of the Clayton Act, exclusive arrangements whereby the four major firms in the industry had foreclosed 75% of the relevant market; the respondent's market share, evidently, was 20%. Kessler and Stern, Competition, Contract, and Vertical Integration, 69 Yale L. J. 1, 53 n. 231 (1959). In the instant case, by way of comparison, the four largest banks after the merger will foreclose 78% of the relevant market. P. 331, supra. And in Standard Fashion Co. v. Magrane-Houston Co., 258 U.S. 346, the Court held violative of § 3 a series of exclusive contracts whereby a single manufacturer controlled 40% of the industry's retail outlets. Doubtless these cases turned to some extent upon whether "by the nature of the market there is room for newcomers." Federal Trade Comm'n v. Motion Picture Adv. Serv. Co., supra, at 395. But they remain highly suggestive in the present context, for as we noted in Brown Shoe Co., supra, at 332, n. 55, integration by merger is more suspect than integration by contract, because of the greater permanence of the former. The market share and market concentration figures in the contract-integration cases, taken together with scholarly opinion, see notes 41 and 42, supra, support, we believe, the inference we draw in the instant case from the figures disclosed by the record.

There is nothing in the record of this case to rebut the inherently anticompetitive tendency manifested by these percentages. There was, to be sure, testimony by bank officers to the effect that competition among banks in Philadelphia was vigorous and would continue to be vigorous after the merger. We think, however, that the District Court's reliance on such evidence was misplaced. This lay evidence on so complex an economic-legal problem as the substantiality of the effect of this merger upon competition was entitled to little weight, in view of the witnesses' failure to give concrete reasons for their conclusions.43

Of equally little value, we think, are the assurances offered by appellees' witnesses that customers dissatisfied with the services of the resulting bank may readily turn to the 40 other banks in the Philadelphia area. In every case short of outright monopoly, the disgruntled customer has alternatives; even in tightly oligopolistic markets, there may be small firms operating. A fundamental purpose of amending § 7 was to arrest the trend toward concentration, the tendency to monopoly, before the consumer's alternatives disappeared through merger, and that purpose would be ill-served if the law stayed its hand until 10, or 20, or 30 more Philadelphia banks were absorbed. This is not a fanciful eventuality, in view of the strong trend toward mergers evident in the area, see p. 331, supra; and we might note also that entry of new competitors into the banking field is far from easy.44

So also, we reject the position that commercial banking, because it is subject to a high degree of governmental regulation, or because it deals in the intangibles of credit and services rather than in the manufacture or sale of tangible commodities, is somehow immune from the anti-competitive effects of undue concentration. Competition among banks exists at every level—price, variety of credit arrangements, convenience of location, attractiveness of physical surroundings, credit information, investment advice, service charges, personal accommodations, advertising, miscellaneous special and extra services—and it is keen; on this appellees' own witnesses were emphatic.45 There is no reason to think that concentration is less inimical to the free play of competition in banking than in other service industries. On the contrary, it is in all probability more inimical. For example, banks compete to fill the credit needs of businessmen. Small businessmen especially are, as a practical matter, confined to their locality for the satisfaction of their credit needs. See note 35, supra. If the number of banks in the locality is reduced, the vigor of competition for filling the marginal small business borrower's needs is likely to diminish. At the same time, his concomitantly greater difficulty in obtaining credit is likely to put him at a disadvantage vis-à-vis larger businesses with which he competes. In this fashion, concentration in banking accelerates concentration generally.

We turn now to three affirmative justifications which appellees offer for the proposed merger. The first is that only through mergers can banks follow their customers to the suburbs and retain their business. This justification does not seem particularly related to the instant merger, but in any event it has no merit. There is an alternative to the merger route: the opening of new branches in the areas to which the customers have moved—so-called de novo branching. Appellees do not contend that they are unable to expand thus, by opening new offices rather than acquiring existing ones, and surely one premise of an antimerger statute such as § 7 is that corporate growth by internal expansion is socially preferable to growth by acquisition.

Second, it is suggested that the increased lending limit of the resulting bank will enable it to compete with the large out-of-state banks, particularly the New York banks, for very large loans. We reject this application of the concept of "countervailing power." Cf. Kiefer-Stewart Co. v. Joseph E. Seagram & Sons, 340 U.S. 211. If anticompetitive effects in one market could be justified by pro-competitive consequences in another, the logical upshot would be that every firm in an industry could, without violating § 7, embark on a series of mergers that would make it in the end as large as the industry leader. For if all the commercial banks in the Philadelphia area merged into one, it would be smaller than the largest bank in New York City. This is not a case, plainly, where two small firms in a market propose to merge in order to be able to compete more successfully with the leading firms in that market. Nor is it a case in which lack of adequate banking facilities is causing hardships to individuals or businesses in the community. The present two largest banks in Philadelphia have lending limits of $8,000,000 each. The only businesses located in the Philadelphia area which find such limits inadequate are large enough readily to obtain bank credit in other cities.

This brings us to appellees' final contention, that Philadelphia needs a bank larger than it now has in order to bring business to the area and stimulate its economic development. See p. 334 and note 10, supra. We are clear, however, that a merger the effect of which "may be substantially to lessen competition" is not saved because, on some ultimate reckoning of social or economic debits and credits, it may be deemed beneficial. A value choice of such magnitude is beyond the ordinary limits of judicial competence, and in any event has been made for us already, by Congress when it enacted the amended § 7. Congress determined to preserve our traditionally competitive economy. It therefore proscribed anticompetitive mergers, the benign and the malignant alike, fully aware, we must assume, that some price might have to be paid.

In holding as we do that the merger of appellees would violate § 7 and must therefore be enjoined, we reject appellees' pervasive suggestion that application of the procompetitive policy of § 7 to the banking industry will have dire, although unspecified, consequences for the national economy. Concededly, PNB and Girard are healthy and strong; they are not undercapitalized or overloaned; they have no management problems; the Philadelphia area is not overbanked; ruinous competition is not in the offing. Section 7 does not mandate cut-throat competition in the banking industry, and does not exclude defenses based on dangers to liquidity or solvency, if to avert them a merger is necessary.46 It does require, however, that the forces of competition be allowed to operate within the broad framework of governmental regulation of the industry. The fact that banking is a highly regulated industry critical to the Nation's welfare makes the play of competition not less important but more so. At the price of some repetition, we note that if the businessman is denied credit because his banking alternatives have been eliminated by mergers, the whole edifice of an entrepreneurial system is threatened; if the costs of banking services and credit are allowed to become excessive by the absence of competitive pressures, virtually all costs, in our credit economy, will be affected; and unless competition is allowed to fulfill its role as an economic regulator in the banking industry, the result may well be even more governmental regulation. Subject to narrow qualifications, it is surely the case that competition is our fundamental national economic policy, offering as it does the only alternative to the cartelization or governmental regimentation of large portions of the economy. Cf. Northern Pac. R. Co. v. United States, 356 U.S. 1, 4. There is no warrant for declining to enforce it in the instant case.

The judgment of the District Court is reversed and the case remanded with direction to enter judgment enjoining the proposed merger.

It is so ordered.

MR. JUSTICE WHITE took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, whom MR. JUSTICE STEWART joins, dissenting.

I suspect that no one will be more surprised than the Government to find that the Clayton Act has carried the day for its case in this Court.

In response to an apparently accelerating trend toward concentration in the commercial banking system in this country, a trend which existing laws were evidently ill-suited to control, numerous bills were introduced in Congress from 1955 to 1960.1 During this period, the Department of Justice and the federal banking agencies2 advocated divergent methods of dealing with the competitive aspects of bank mergers, the former urging the extension of § 7 of the Clayton Act to cover such mergers and the latter supporting a regulatory scheme under which the effect of a bank merger on competition would be only one of the factors to be considered in determining whether the merger would be in the public interest. The Justice Department's proposals were repeatedly rejected by Congress, and the regulatory approach of the banking agencies was adopted in the Bank Merger Act of 1960. See infra, pp. 379-383.

Sweeping aside the "design fashioned in the Bank Merger Act" as "predicated upon uncertainty as to the scope of § 7 of the Clayton Act (ante, p. 349), the Court today holds § 7 to be applicable to bank mergers and concludes that it has been violated in this case. I respectfully submit that this holding, which sanctions a remedy regarded by Congress as inimical to the best interests of the banking industry and the public, and which will in large measure serve to frustrate the objectives of the Bank Merger Act, finds no justification in either the terms of the 1950 amendment of the Clayton Act or the history of the statute.

I.

The key to this case is found in the special position occupied by commercial banking in the economy of this country. With respect to both the nature of the operations performed and the degree of governmental supervision involved, it is fundamentally different from ordinary manufacturing and mercantile businesses.

The unique powers of commercial banks to accept demand deposits, provide checking account services, and lend against fractional reserves permit the banking system as a whole to create a supply of "money," a function which is indispensable to the maintenance of the structure of our national economy. And the amount of the funds held by commercial banks is very large indeed; demand deposits alone represent approximately three-fourths of the money supply in the United States.3 Since a bank's assets must be sufficiently liquid to accommodate demand withdrawals, short-term commercial and industrial loans are the major element in bank portfolios, thus making commercial banks the principal source of shortterm business credit. Many other services are also provided by banks, but in these more or less collateral areas they receive more active competition from other financial institutions.4

Deposit banking operations affect not only the volume of money and credit, but also the value of the dollar and the stability of the currency system. In this field, considerations other than simply the preservation of competition are relevant. Moreover, commercial banks are entrusted with the safekeeping of large amounts of funds belonging to individuals and corporations. Unlike the ordinary investor, these depositors do not regard their funds as subject to a risk of loss and, at least in the case of demand depositors, they do not receive a return for taking such a risk. A bank failure is a community disaster; its impact first strikes the bank's depositors most heavily, and then spreads throughout the economic life of the community.5 Safety and soundness of banking practices are thus critical factors in any banking system.

The extensive blanket of state and federal regulation of commercial banking, much of which is aimed at limiting competition, reflects these factors. Since the Court's opinion describes, at some length, aspects of the supervision exercised by the federal banking agencies (ante, pp. 327-330), I do no more here than point out that, in my opinion, such regulation evidences a plain design grounded on solid economic considerations to deal with banking as a specialized field.

This view is confirmed by the Bank Merger Act of 1960 and its history.

Federal legislation dealing with bank mergers6 dates from 1918, when Congress provided that, subject to the approval of the Comptroller of the Currency, two or more national banks could consolidate to form a new national bank;7 similar provision was made in 1927 for the consolidation of a state and a national bank resulting in a national bank.8 In 1952 mergers of national and state banks into national banks were authorized, also conditioned on approval by the Comptroller of the Currency.9 In 1950 Congress authorized the theretofore prohibited10 merger or consolidation of a national bank with a state bank when the assuming or resulting bank would be a state bank.11 In addition, the Federal Deposit Insurance Act was amended to require the approval of the FDIC for all mergers and consolidations between insured and noninsured banks, and of specified federal banking agencies for conversions of insured banks into insured state banks if the conversion would result in the capital stock or surplus of the newly formed bank being less than that of the converting bank.12 The Act further required insured banks merging with insured state banks to secure the approval of the Comptroller of the Currency if the assuming bank would be a national bank, and the approval of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the FDIC, respectively, if the assuming or resulting bank would be a state member bank or nonmember insured bank.13

None of this legislation prescribed standards by which the appropriate federal banking agencies were to be guided in determining the significance to be attributed to the anticompetitive effects of a proposed merger. As previously noted (supra, p. 373), Congress became increasingly concerned with this problem in the 1950's. The antitrust laws apparently provided no solution; in only one case prior to 1960, United States v. Firstamerica Corp., Civil No. 38139, N. D. Cal., March 30, 1959, settled by consent decree, had either the Sherman or Clayton Act been invoked to attack a commercial bank merger.

Indeed the inapplicability to bank mergers of § 7 of the Clayton Act, even after it was amended in 1950, was, for a time, an explicit premise on which the Department of Justice performed its antitrust duties. In passing upon an application for informal clearance of a bank merger in 1955, the Department stated:

And in testifying before the Senate Committee on Banking and Currency in 1957 Attorney General Brownell, speaking of bank mergers, noted:

Similar statements were repeatedly made to Congress by Justice Department representatives in the years prior to the enactment of the Bank Merger Act.14

The inapplicability of § 7 to bank mergers was also an explicit basis on which Congress acted in passing the Bank Merger Act of 1960. The Senate Report on S. 1062, the bill that was finally enacted, stated:

During the floor debates Representative Spence, the Chairman of the House Committee on Banking and Currency, recognized the same difficulty: "The Clayton Act is ineffective as to bank mergers because in the case of banks it covers only stock acquisitions and bank mergers are not accomplished that way." 106 Cong. Rec. 7257 (1960).16

But instead of extending the scope of § 7 to cover bank mergers, as numerous proposed amendments to that section were designed to accomplish,17 Congress made the deliberate policy judgment that "it is impossible to subject bank mergers to the simple rule of section 7 of the Clayton Act. Under that act, a merger would be barred if it might tend substantially to lessen competition, regardless of the effects on the public interest." 105 Cong. Rec. 8076 (1959) (remarks of Senator Robertson, a sponsor of S. 1062). Because of the peculiar nature of the commercial banking industry, its crucial role in the economy, and its intimate connection with the fiscal and monetary operations of the Government, Congress rejected the notion that the general economic and business premises of the Clayton Act should be the only considerations applicable to this field. Unrestricted bank competition was thought to have been a major cause of the panic of 1907 and of the bank failures of the 1930's,18 and was regarded as a highly undesirable condition to impose on banks in the future:

Thus the Committee on Banking and Currency recommended "continuance of the existing exemption from section 7 of the Clayton Act." 105 Cong. Rec. 8076 (1959). Congress accepted this recommendation; it decided to handle the problem of concentration in commercial banking "through banking laws, specially framed to fit the particular needs of the field . . . ." S. Rep. No. 196, 86th Cong., 1st Sess. 18 (1959). As finally enacted in 1960, the Bank Merger Act embodies the regulatory approach advocated by the banking agencies, vesting in them responsibility for its administration and placing the scheme within the framework of existing banking laws as an amendment to § 18 (c) of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act, 12 U. S. C. (Supp. IV, 1963), § 1828 (c).20 It maintains the latter Act's requirement of advance approval by the appropriate federal agency for mergers between insured banks and between insured and noninsured banks (supra, pp. 375-377), but establishes that such approval is necessary in every merger of this type. To aid the respective agencies in determining whether to approve a merger, and in "the interests of uniform standards" (12 U. S. C. (Supp. IV, 1963) § 1828 (c)), the Act requires the two agencies not making the particular decision and the Attorney General to submit to the immediately responsible agency reports on the competitive factors involved. It further provides that in addition to considering the banking factors examined by the FDIC in connection with applications to become an insured bank, which focus primarily on matters of safety and soundness,21 the approving agency "shall also take into consideration the effect of the transaction on competition (including any tendency toward monopoly), and shall not approve the transaction unless, after considering all of such factors, it finds the transaction to be in the public interest." 12 U. S. C. (Supp. IV, 1963) § 1828 (c).

The congressional purpose clearly emerges from the terms of the statute and from the committee reports, hearings, and floor debates on the bills. Time and again it was repeated that effect on competition was not to be the controlling factor in determining whether to approve a bank merger, that a merger could be approved as being in the public interest even though it would cause a substantial lessening of competition. The following statement is typical:

The foregoing statement also shows that it was the congressional intention to place the responsibility for approval squarely on the banking agencies; the report of the Attorney General on the competitive aspects of a merger was to be advisory only.23 And there was deliberately omitted any attempt to specify or restrict the kinds of circumstances in which the agencies might properly determine that a proposed merger would be in the public interest notwithstanding its adverse effect on competition.24

What Congress has chosen to do about mergers and their effect on competition in the highly specialized field of commercial banking could not be more "crystal clear." (Supra, p. 382.) But in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the Court, with perfect equanimity, finds "uncertainty" in the foundations of the Bank Merger Act (ante, p. 349) and on this premise puts it aside as irrelevant to the task of construing the scope of § 7 of the Clayton Act.

I am unable to conceive of a more inappropriate case in which to overturn the considered opinion of all concerned as to the reach of prior legislation.25 For 10 years everyone—the department responsible for antitrust law enforcement, the banking industry, the Congress, and the bar—proceeded on the assumption that the 1950 amendment of the Clayton Act did not affect bank mergers. This assumption provided a major impetus to the enactment of remedial legislation, and Congress, when it finally settled on what it thought was the solution to the problem at hand, emphatically rejected the remedy now brought to life by the Court.

The result is, of course, that the Bank Merger Act is almost completely nullified; its enactment turns out to have been an exorbitant waste of congressional time and energy. As the present case illustrates, the Attorney General's report to the designated banking agency is no longer truly advisory, for if the agency's decision is not satisfactory a § 7 suit may be commenced immediately.26 The bank merger's legality will then be judged solely from its competitive aspects, unencumbered by any considerations peculiar to banking.27 And if such a suit were deemed to lie after a bank merger has been consummated, there would then be introduced into this field, for the first time to any significant extent, the threat of divestiture of assets and all the complexities and disruption attendant upon the use of that sanction.28 The only vestige of the Bank Merger Act which remains is that the banking agencies will have an initial veto.29

This frustration of a manifest congressional design is, in my view, a most unwarranted intrusion upon the legislative domain. I submit that whatever may have been the congressional purpose in 1950, Congress has now so plainly pronounced its current judgment that bank mergers are not within the reach of § 7 that this Court is duty bound to effectuate its choice.

But I need not rest on this proposition, for, as will now be shown, there is nothing in the 1950 amendment to § 7 or its legislative history to support the conclusion that Congress even then intended to subject bank mergers to this provision of the Clayton Act.

II.

Prior to 1950, § 7 of the Clayton Act read, in pertinent part, as follows:

In 1950 this section was amended to read (the major amendments being indicated in italics):

If Congress did intend the 1950 amendment to reach bank mergers, it certainly went at the matter in a very peculiar way. While prohibiting asset acquisitions having the anticompetive effects described in § 7, it limited the applicability of that provision to corporations subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission, which does not include banks. And it reenacted the stock-acquisition provision in the very same language which—as it was fully aware—had been interpreted not to reach the type of merger customarily used in the banking industry. See infra, pp. 389-393. In the past this Court has drawn the normal inference that such a reenactment indicates congressional adoption of the prior judicial statutory construction. E. g., United States v. Dixon, 347 U.S. 381; Overstreet v. North Shore Corp., 318 U.S. 125, 131-132.

In this instance, however, the Court holds that the stock-acquisition provision underwent an expansive metamorphosis, so that it now embraces all mergers or consolidations involving an exchange of stock. Since bank mergers usually, if not always, do involve exchanges of stock, the effect of this construction is to rob the Federal Trade Commission provision relating to asset acquisitions of all force as a substantive limitation upon the scope of § 7; according to the Court the purpose of that provision was merely to ensure the Commission's role in the enforcement of § 7. Ante, pp. 346-348. In short, under this reasoning bank mergers to all intents and purposes are fully within the reach of § 7.

A more circumspect look at the 1950 amendment of § 7 and its background will show that this construction is not tenable.

The language of the stock-acquisition provision itself is hardly congenial to the Court's interpretation. The PNB-Girard merger is technically a consolidation, governed by § 20 of the national banking laws, 12 U. S. C. (Supp. IV, 1963) § 215. Under that section, the corporate existence of both PNB and Girard, all of their rights, franchises, assets, and liabilities, would be automatically vested in the resulting bank, which would operate under the PNB charter. PNB itself would acquire nothing. Rather, the two banks would be creating a new entity by the amalgamation of their properties, and the subsequent conversion of Girard stock (which would then represent ownership in a nonfunctioning entity) into stock of the resulting bank would simply be part of the mechanics by which ownership in the new entity would be reflected. Clearly this is not a case of a corporation acquiring the stock of another functioning corporation, which is the only situation where "the effect of . . . [a stock] acquisition may be substantially to lessen competition." (Emphasis added.)

There are further crucial differences between a merger and a stock acquisition. A merger normally requires public notice and the approval of the holders of two-thirds of the outstanding shares of each corporation, and dissenting shareholders have the right to receive in cash the appraised value of their shares.30 A purchase of stock may be done privately, and the only approval involved is that of the individual parties to the transaction. Unlike a merged company, a corporation whose stock is acquired usually remains in business as a subsidiary of the acquiring corporation.31

The Government, however, contends that a merger more closely resembles a stock acquisition than an asset acquisition because of one similarity of central importance: the acquisition by one corporation of an immediate voice in the management of the business of another corporation. But this is obviously true a fortiori of asset acquisitions of sufficient magnitude to fall within the prohibition of § 7; if a corporation buys the plants, equipment, inventory, etc., of another corporation, it acquires absolute control over, not merely a voice in the management of, another business.

The legislative history of the 1950 amendment also unquestionably negates any inference that Congress intended to reach bank mergers. It is true that the purpose was "to plug a loophole" in § 7 (95 Cong. Rec. 11485 (1949) (remarks of Representative Celler)). But simply to state this broad proposition does not answer the precise questions presented here: what was the nature of the loophole sought to be closed; what were the means chosen to close it?

The answer to the latter question is unmistakably indicated by the relationship between the 1950 amendment and previous judicial decisions. In Arrow-Hart & Hegeman Elec. Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, 291 U.S. 587, this Court, by a divided vote, ruled on the scope of the Federal Trade Commission's remedial powers under the original Clayton Act. After the Commission had issued a § 7 complaint against a holding company which had been formed by the stockholders of two manufacturing corporations, steps were taken to avoid the Commission's jurisdiction. Two new holding companies were formed, each acquired all the common stock of one of the manufacturing companies, and each issued its stock directly to the stockholders of the original holding company. This company then dissolved and the two new holding companies and their respective manufacturing subsidiaries merged into one corporation. This Court held that the Commission had no authority, after the merger, to order the resulting corporation to divest itself of assets. An essential part of this holding was that the merger in question, which was technically a consolidation similar to that here planned by PNB and Girard, was not a stock acquisition within the prohibitions of § 7: "If the merger of the two manufacturing corporations and the combination of their assets was in any respect a violation of any antitrust law, as to which we express no opinion, it was necessarily a violation of statutory prohibitions other than those found in the Clayton Act." 291 U. S., at 599; see id., at 595.32

This decision, along with two others earlier handed down by this Court (Thatcher Mfg. Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n and Swift & Co. v. Federal Trade Comm'n, decided together with Federal Trade Comm'n v. Western Meat Co., 272 U.S. 554), perhaps provided more of a spur to enactment of the "assets" amendment to § 7 than any other single factor. These decisions were universally regarded as opening the unfortunate loophole whereby § 7 could be evaded through the use of an asset acquisition. Representative Celler expressed the view of Congress in this fashion:

Since this Court's decisions were cast in terms of the scope of the Federal Trade Commission's jurisdiction, Congress, in amending § 7 so as to close that gap, emphasized its expectation—made plain in the committee reports, hearings, and debates—that the Commission would assume the principal role in enforcing the section.34 Implicit here is that no change in the enforcement powers of the other agencies named in § 11 was contemplated.35 Of more importance, the legislative history demonstrates that it was the asset-acquisition provision that was designed to plug the loophole created by Thatcher, Swift, and Arrow. Although Arrow, unlike Thatcher and Swift, involved a consolidation of the same type as the PNB-Girard merger, the members of Congress drew no distinction among these cases, invariably discussing all three of them in the same breath as examples of asset acquisitions.36 Indeed, the House report stated that

And on the Senate floor it was pointed out that "the method by which . . . [the merger in Arrow] had been accomplished was an innocent one . . . ." 96 Cong. Rec. 16505 (1950). (Emphasis added.) Clearly the understanding of Congress was that a consolidation of two corporations was an acquisition of assets.37

Nor did Congress act inadvertently or without purpose in limiting the asset-acquisition provision to corporations subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission, thereby excluding bank mergers. The reports, hearings, and debates on the 1950 amendment reveal that Congress was then concerned with the rising tide of industrial concentration—i. e., "the external expansion. . . through mergers, acquisitions, and consolidations"38 of corporations engaged in manufacturing, mining, merchandising, and of other kindred commercial endeavors. Specialized areas of the economy such as banking were not even considered. Thus the Federal Trade Commission's 1948 report on mergers recounted the statistics on concentration in a multitude of industries— e. g., steel, cement, electrical equipment, food and dairy products, tobacco, textiles, paper, chemicals, rubber—but included not one figure on banking concentration.39 This report was repeatedly cited and heavily relied on by members of Congress and others to demonstrate the magnitude of the merger movement and the economic dangers it presented.40 In the committee hearings the focus was exclusively upon amalgamation in the ordinary commercial fields,41 and similarly the Senate and House reports spoke solely of industrial concentration as the evil to be remedied.42 On the floor of the House, Representative Celler indicated the extent of concentration of industrial power:

The legislatory history is thus singularly devoid of any evidence that Congress sought to deal with the special problem of banking concentration.

I do not mean to suggest, of course, that § 7 of the Clayton Act is thereby rendered applicable only to ordinary commercial and industrial corporations and not to firms in any "regulated" sector of the economy. The point is that when Congress included in § 7 asset acquisitions by corporations subject to the Federal Trade Commission's jurisdiction, and at the same time continued in § 11 the Federal Reserve Board's jurisdiction over banks, it was not acting irrationally. Rather, the absence of any mention of banks in the legislative history of the 1950 amendment, viewed in light of the prior congressional treatment of banking as a distinctive area with special characteristics and needs, compels the conclusion that bank mergers were simply not then regarded as part of the loophole to be plugged.43

This conclusion is confirmed by a number of additional considerations. It was not until after the passage of the 1950 amendment of § 7 that Representative Celler, its co-sponsor, requested the staff of the Antitrust Subcommittee of the House Committee on the Judiciary "to prepare a report indicating the concentration existing in our banking system." Staff of Subcommittee No. 5, House Committee on the Judiciary, 82d Cong., 2d Sess., Report on Bank Mergers and Concentration of Banking Facilities III (1952). The introduction to the report reveals that:

It is also worth noting that in 1956 Representative Celler himself introduced another amendment to § 7, explaining that "all the bill [H. R. 5948] does is plug a loophole in the present law dealing with bank mergers . . . . This loophole exists because section 7 of the Clayton Act prohibits bank mergers . . . only if such mergers are accomplished by stock acquisition." 102 Cong. Rec. 2109 (1956). The bill read in pertinent part: "[N]o bank . . . shall acquire . . . the whole or any part of the assets of another corporation engaged also in commerce . . . ." Ibid. The amendment passed the House but was defeated in the Senate.

For all these reasons, I think the conclusion is inescapable that § 7 of the Clayton Act does not apply to the PNB-Girard merger. The Court's contrary conclusion seems to me little better than a tour de force.44

Memorandum of MR. JUSTICE GOLDBERG.

I agree fully with my Brother HARLAN that § 7 of the Clayton Act has no application to bank mergers of the type involved here, and I therefore join in the conclusions expressed in his opinion on that point. However, while I thus dissent from the Court's holding with respect to the applicability of the Clayton Act to this merger, I wish to make clear that I do not necessarily dissent from its judgment invalidating the merger. To do so would require me to conclude in addition that on the record as it stands the Government has failed to prove a violation of the Sherman Act, which is fully applicable to the commercial banking business. In my opinion there is a substantial Sherman Act issue in this case, but since the Court does not reach it and since my views relative thereto would be superfluous in light of today's disposition of the case, I express no ultimate conclusion concerning it. Compare Rescue Army v. Municipal Court of Los Angeles, 331 U.S. 549, 585 (Murphy, J., dissenting); Poe v. Ullman, 367 U.S. 497, 555 (STEWART, J., dissenting).