SUNKIST GROWERS, INC., ET AL.
v.
WINCKLER & SMITH CITRUS PRODUCTS CO. ET AL.
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Sunkist Growers, a cooperative of citrus fruit growers operating through three subsidiary agricultural associations, challenged an antitrust conviction based on alleged price-fixing and market allocation agreements among the growers. The Supreme Court granted certiorari limited to whether growers acting through Capper-Volstead Act-exempt agricultural cooperatives could be found liable under the Sherman Act solely for agreements among themselves regarding processing division and pricing of their collectively processed fruit. The Court's decision addressed whether such intragroup conduct by exempt cooperatives violated federal antitrust law.
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Petition for writ of certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit granted limited to Question 1 presented by the petition, which reads as follows:
“1. Where a group of citrus fruit growers form a cooperative organization for the purpose of collectively processing and marketing their fruit, and carry out those functions through the agency of three cooperative agricultural associations, each of which is basically wholly owned and governed by those growers, and each of which is admittedly entitled to the exemption from the antitrust laws accorded to agricultural cooperatives by the Capper-Volstead Act (7 U.
S. C. A., sec. 291) — is an unlawful conspiracy, combination or agreement established under Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act upon proof only that these growers, through the agency of these three cooperatives, agreed among only themselves with respect to the extent of the division of the function of processing between them or with respect to the price they would charge in the open market for the fruit and the by-products thereof processed and marketed by them?”