Decree for complainants, and defendants appeal. Affirmed.

J. Wallace Nichol, W. H. Fuller, and William T. Chantland, all of Washington, D. C., for appellants.

Levi Cooke and George R. Beneman, both of Washington, D. C., A. Leo Weil, of Pittsburgh, Pa., and William Wallace, Jr., of New York City, for appellees.

Before Smyth, Chief Justice, and Robb and Van Orsdel, Associate Justices, Smyth, Chief Justice, dissenting.

VAN ORSDEL, Associate Justice:

Appellee corporations filed a bill in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia for an injunction to restrain appellant, Federal Trade Commission, from enforcing or attempting to enforce an order issued by the Commission against the complainant companies requiring them to furnish monthly reports of the cost of production, balance sheets, and other information in detail, upon a large variety of subjects relative to the business in which complainant corporations are engaged.

The authority under which the Commission assumes to act is expressed in a resolution, wherein it is stated that at a hearing held by a Committee of the House of Representatives the Commission was requested to suggest what might be done to reduce the high cost of living. In response the Commission recommended to the Committee" that it would be desirable to obtain and publish from time to time current information with respect to the 'production, ownership, manufacture, storage, and distribution of food stuffs, or other necessaries, and the products or by-products arising from or in connection with the preparation and manufacture thereof, together with figures of cost and wholesale and retail prices,' and particularly with respect to various basic industries, including coal and steel."

An appropriation of $150,000 was made available and the Commission resolved to "proceed to the collection and publication of such information with respect to such basic industries as the said appropriation and other funds at its command will permit; and that such action be started as soon as possible with respect to the coal industry and the steel industry, including in the latter closely related industries such as iron ore, coke, and pig iron industries."

The alleged purpose of this report was to compile in combined or consolidated form the data received from individual companies, and to issue currently in such form accurate and comprehensive information regarding changes in the conditions of the industry, both for the benefit of the industry and of the public. At the same time orders were issued to the complainant coal and

coke companies requiring them to report the "monthly costs of production for the several products designated and other data as specified in the form prescribed." Accordingly, the Commission issued to each of the complainant companies forms of reports, schedules, and questionnaires, calling for detailed information regarding the amount of products produced by the several complainants respectively, the sales and contract prices thereof, and orders booked by them, the amounts allo'cated by them to depreciation, and administrative and selling expenses, and also to file with the Commission quarterly income statements and balance sheets. addition the Commission required complainants to submit their accounts and books for inspection to enable it to check the reports which complainants were required to furnish from time to time. Complainants were warned that upon failure to comply with the orders of the Commission the penalties prescribed by Section 10 of the Trade Commission Act would be imposed upon them.

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Complainants allege, and it is not denied in the answer, that they are engaged in producing, manufacturing, and making sales in the States wherein their producing and manufacturing operations are conducted, and all of them are conducting mining operations or manufacturing plants, or both." The location of the manufacturing and mining plants is given and it appears that the companies are engaged in producing pig iron, tin plate, strip steel, billets, slabs, ingots, blooms, and other products of iron and steel, finished and unfinished. It further appears that some of the companies are engaged in coal mining, manufacturing coke, and mining of ore. Defendant commission avers in its answer that with the exception of three companies named, "sixty-five per cent or more of the sales made by each of complainants is in interstate or foreign commerce, and that the greater portion of the principal raw materials of each concern is purchased and transported in interstate commerce to their converting plants.”

The right of the Commission to make the inquiry here involved is based upon the power of Congress to secure information concerning any subject matter in regard to which it has been given the power to legislate, and upon the further proposition that when one phase of a subject matter is within the jurisdiction of Congress it possesses the power to secure information as to the whole of the subject matter as a guide to further legislation. It is also urged that power to obtain information is not limited to interstate commerce but includes intrastate commerce as well, when the two phases are a part of one subject; that the orders and report forms issued to complainants and others are for the purpose of inquiring into the whole of the steel industry of the United States, which industry, it is averred, includes both interstate

and intrastate commerce. The Commission then seeks to justify its proposed inquiry into complainants' business, both interstate and intrastate, upon the hypothesis that the publication and dissemination of the information obtained will benefit the public and furnish a guide for future legislation.

Complainants having failed and refused to make the reports, the Commission by written notice threatened the imposition of penalties for delay or failure to make due report as required. It is to restrain the Commission from carrying the threats into effect that the present injunction is sought.

The Commission answered the bill and complainants moved to strike out certain parts of the amended answer and to strike the entire amended answer from the files. The court ordered: "First. That the motion to strike out certain parts of the amended answer be overruled without prejudice to the right of the plaintiffs on any further hearings in said suit to raise objections to matters not properly pleaded. Second. That the second motion to strike the entire amended answer from the files be and the same is hereby denied except as to the ground that the said amended answer set forth no defense to the bill of complaint."

Defendants refusing to further plead or amend their answer, and expressing their willingness to stand upon their answer as a sufficient and complete defense, the court, treating the motion to strike as in the nature of a demurrer, entered a judgment making the temporary injunction final, from which decree this appeal was taken.

The extensive arguments set out in the answer relative to the powers delegated by Congress to the Commission; the power of Congress under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution; the authority of the Commission to investigate the business affairs of a shipper in interstate commerce; the delegated power to inquire into the production of any commodity in nation-wide use, and the constitutional power of the Commission to compel disclosure of the business methods employed by manufacturers and producers, are mere legal conclusions, not admitted by the motion to strike.

The statutory authority under which the Commission in this instance presumes to act is found in Section 6 of the Federal Trade Commission Act (38 Stat. 717), which provides: "That the commission shall also have power (a) To gather and compile information concerning, and to investigate from time to time the organization, business, conduct, practices, and management of any corporation engaged in commerce, excepting banks and common carriers subject to the Act to regulate commerce, and its relation to other corporations and to individuals, associations, and partnerships. (b) To require by general or special orders, corporations engaged in commerce,

excepting banks and common carriers subject to the Act to regulate commerce, or any class of them, or any of them, respectively, to file with the commission in such form as the commission may prescribe, annual or special, or both annual and special, reports or answers in writing to specific questions, furnishing to the commission such information as it may require as to the organization, business, conduct, practices, management, and relation to other corporations, partnerships, and individuals of the respective corporations filing such reports or answers in writing. Such reports and answers shall be made under oath, or otherwise, as the commission may prescribe, and shall be filed with the commission within such reasonable period as the commission may prescribe, unless additional time be granted in any case by the commission."

The Act further authorizes the Commission "to make public from time to time such portions of the information obtained by it hereunder, except trade secrets and names of customers, as it shall deem expedient in the public interest and to make annual and special reports to the Congress and to submit therewith recommendations for additional legislation; and to provide for the publication of its reports and decisions in such form and manner as may be best adapted for public information and use.

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The word "commerce as used in the Act is defined as commerce among the several States or with foreign nations, or in any Territory of the United States or in the District of Columbia, or between any such Territory and another, or between any such Territory and any State or foreign nation, or between the District of Columbia and any State or Territory or foreign nation."

It will be observed that the inquiry instituted by the Commission originated from a discussion of a Committee of Congress relative to the high cost of living, and an appropriation by Congress of a lump sum to enable the Commission to conduct such investigations as it might deem proper. There was no specific direction by Congress to make an investigation of the steel, iron, or coal business. The Commission on its own motion and by resolution instituted this investigation.

The Commission is not proceeding upon any complaint filed before it, charging complainants with unfair competition or the violation of the Federal Trade Commission Act or the Antitrust Acts. Neither is it the expressed intention of the Commission to make an investigation relative to the operations of complainant companies in interstate commerce. The investigation seems to be more in the nature of a news-gathering expedition, in hope of securing something of public interest for publication, or possibly subject matter for future legislation by Congress. Common justice would seem to demand that before the business methods pursued by a corporation or an individual should be investigated, the party

should be apprised either by a formal charge or by notice of the extent of the purposed investigation, in order that a day in court may be accorded. This is essential to determine whether the Commission is acting within its jurisdiction and to meet the charges preferred.

This brings us to the point of determining whether in the present investigation the Commission was acting within its jurisdiction. The authority of the Commission, we think, is limited by the acts of Congress to investigating and reporting upon unfair methods of competition in interstate commerce, the enforcement of antitrust decrees and violations of the antitrust laws, and the making and publishing of reports thereon. The powers of the Commission are limited to matters directly relevant to interstate commerce. In other words, the corporation under investigation must not only be engaged in interstate commerce, but the subject under investigation must be so related to interstate commerce that its regulation may be accomplished by act of Congress. Where the operations of a corporation, engaged in both interstate and intrastate commerce, are so interwoven and intermingled as to be inseparable, it may be conceded that in order to regulate interstate commerce, the intrastate phases may be subjected to regulation and possible restriction, since the whole subject is thus brought within the jurisdiction of Congress.

But that is not this case. Here there is no intermingling in such manner as to render the interstate and intrastate features inseparable. Indeed, it is said of the iron and steel companies, in the brief of counsel for the Commission, that "appellees bring their raw material from other States into those States where their plants are situated, and when the conversion or fabrication is complete approximately 65% of the total of such converted products is sold and shipped into other States." Three separate and distinct operations are involved. First, the shipment of raw materials to the plants. If from outside of the State, the materials are in the nature of freight in interstate commerce from the time they are delivered to the carrier until they are delivered by the carrier at the plant. Second, the processes of manufacture by which the raw materials are converted into finished products, during which time the complainants are not engaged in commerce. Third, the sale and delivery of the finished product. If this is made outside of the State where the product has been manufactured, the product is in commerce as freight from the time of delivery to the carrier at the plant until the carrier in turn delivers it to the consignee at destination. Indeed the answer tacitly concedes the three operations by complainants the assembling, the manufacture, and the sale of the manufactured article.

It, therefore, does not appear that complainants are common carriers or engaged in the operation of any of