Other People's Mail

One of man's vicarious pleasures is reading other people's mail. In Chicago last week, the antitrust suit involving Du Pont and General Motors provided the Government with an opportunity to air confidential letters dating back 30 years and more. No matter what the letters proved or disproved about the Government's charge that Du Font's control of G.M. restricts competition, there was no doubt that they were fascinating footnotes to the growth of Du Pont.

In 1921, Lammot du Pont wrote his brother Pierre listing as "O.K." those G.M. units which were buying 100% of their paint, Fabrikoid (artificial leather) and Pyralin (plastic windows for side curtains) from Du Pont. Those who were not buying 100% were either classified under "good reason" or "no reason." Lammot added that Du Font's sales department "wouldn't mind seeing things going a little faster."

However, another exchange in 1922 showed that when Du Pont had a big chance to exercise a monopoly, it refused to do so. The chance came with its perfection of Duco, the quick-drying, auto-body finish which revolutionized painting in the industry. Before Duco, Body Builder Lawrence P. Fisher testified at the trial, it took 21 days to paint and dry a Cadillac. "If we had carried on with paint," said Fisher, so much storage space would have been needed that "we'd have had a roof over Michigan." Had Du Pont limited the sale of Duco to G.M., that company might have run away with the auto market. But Pierre du Pont wrote Irenee du Pont in 1922 that while this step had been considered, it was vetoed; it might "entrench competition" (i.e., tie auto companies too close to suppliers) later on when others developed quick-drying finishes, thus cut Du Font's chances of selling outside G.M.

Moreover, despite Du Font's desire to boost its sales to G.M., a G.M. subsidiary could cut off its buying from a Du Pont subsidiary. In 1934, G.M.'s Vice President John Pratt wrote G.M.'s New Departure Division that Du Pont had complained because New Departure stopped buying ammonia from Du Font's National Ammonia Co. New Departure wrote back it did not even know National Ammonia belonged to Du Pont, but doubted it would make any difference; their ammonia had been dropped because it had water in it.

In 1945, Vice President Pratt had also suggested that General of the Army George C. Marshall should be elected to G.M.'s board on his retirement. G.M.'s Chairman Alfred P. Sloan passed the idea on to Du Font's Chairman Lammot du Pont saying that Marshall (then 65) was probably too old but that he "might do us some good." Lammot du Pont rejected the idea: "My reasons for not favoring [Marshall's] membership on the board are: first, his age; second, his lack of stockholdings; and third, his lack of experience in industrial business affairs."

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