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Both Texas Industries and Radcliff Materials manufactured and sold ready-mix concrete. A purchaser of
concrete from Texas Industries filed suit in Federal District Court alleging that Texas Industries and
certain unnamed companies were raising concrete prices in violation of the Sherman Act. The petitioner
sought treble damages under the Clayton Act.
Texas Industries learned through discovery that Radcliff Materials was the alleged co-conspirator.
Texas Industries filed a third-party complaint against Radcliff Materials, seeking contribution should
Texas Industries be held liable in the original action. The District Court dismissed the third-party
complaint for
failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted, holding that federal law does not allow an
antitrust defendant to recover in contribution from alleged co-conspirators. The Court of Appeals
affirmed.
The Supreme Court affirmed the decisions.
In the case the Supreme Court stated that
There is, of course, “no federal general common law.” Erie
R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 78 (1938). Nevertheless, the Court has recognized the need and
authority in some limited areas to formulate what has come to be known as “federal common law.”
See United States v. Standard Oil
Co., 332 U.S. 301, 308 (1947). These instances are “few and restricted,” Wheeldin
v. Wheeler, 373 U.S. 647, 651 (1963), and fall into essentially two categories: those in which a
federal rule of decision is “necessary to protect uniquely federal interests,” Banco
Nacional de Cuba v. Sabbatino, 376 U.S. 398, 426 (1964), and those in which Congress has given the
courts the power to develop substantive law, Wheeldin v. Wheeler, supra, at 652.
Full Text: Texas Industries, Inc.
v. Radcliff Materials, Inc. 451 U.S. 630 (1981) |