In light of the U.S. government”s current antitrust case against
Microsoft it only seemed fitting to discuss the architect of the last
big case with similar ramifications.
Harold H. Greene died this past January 29th. Greene presided
over one of the most far reaching cases in American history – the
antitrust suit that led to the breakup of AT&T, at the time the
world”s largest corporation. And, as everyone hopes they are one
day eulogized, Harold Greene led a full life.
Greene was born in Germany, 1923. His father owned a jewelry
store and, as was the case in the Germany of that era, the family
faced Hitler”s anti-Semitism. In 1939, they fled, making their way
in Anne Frank-like hiding, from Belgium to Vichy, France, and on
to Spain and Portugal, before arriving in America in 1943.
Greene was drafted into the Army and he was immediately sent
back to Europe where he was in military intelligence, assigned to
interrogate German prisoners.
He was once asked what it was like to return with a victorious
army to his native Germany. There was little time to formulate
his thoughts in “such grandiose terms,” he said. But often, his
concerns were “I wonder where we are going to stay tonight” and
“I hope the food is cooked better than it was yesterday.”
After the war, Greene sensed that law “was a profession where I
might be able to make a contribution.” After just two years of
undergraduate work, he was admitted to George Washington
Law School. He then launched a career that spanned 45 years as
a government lawyer and judge.
Greene eventually found his way to the Justice Department where
he played an integral role in creating the civil rights legislation
that helped transform the nation in the 1960s. He was an aide to
Attorney General Robert Kennedy and is credited with being the
legal architect of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting
Rights Act of 1965.
Of those days at the Justice Department, Greene said, “The
Attorney General would call at 5 o”clock in the evening and say,
”Tomorrow morning we”re going to try to integrate the
University of Mississippi. Get us a memo on what we”re likely to
do, what we can do if the governor sends the National Guard
there – and I want to have it on my desk at 8 o”clock tomorrow
morning.” That”s what we did.”
It was perhaps the most rewarding work of his career. He
marveled at how quickly the Civil Rights Act had its intended
effect. “Within days, everybody all over the South – restaurants,
hotels, motels – just gave up their previous opposition.”
After his civil rights work, LBJ appointed Greene to the
predecessor to today”s D.C. Superior Court. In 1968 rioting
broke out in the District after the assassination of the Rev. Martin
Luther King Jr. In dealing with those arrested, Greene said he
“felt very strongly that the judiciary shouldn”t cease to function as
a judiciary merely because we were in the midst of difficult civil
disturbances.”
Greene always felt that “In criminal cases it is the individual that
counts.” He held hearings around the clock during those
turbulent times of the late 1960s and early 1970s. As chief judge
he earned a reputation as being one who also strongly opposed
sentencing guidelines because they forced judges to order jail time
for defendants who did not deserve it.
In 1978, President Jimmy Carter nominated Greene to the U.S.
District Court. One of the first cases he was handed was the
AT&T matter which had languished for years before he got it.
In the U.S. vs. AT&T, the government said the telephone giant
was illegally stifling competition, using regulator-sanctioned
profits from the telephone business to subsidize unregulated
businesses, like making equipment.
There were some 30 or 40 lawyers on each side but Greene was
able to quickly bring the case to trial. When some thought it
would last years, the trial took about 11 months.
The government”s position that AT&T was a monopoly and had
to be broken up was not widely popular. Being the son of a
scientist who spent his career at Bell Laboratories, many of our
family conversations revolved around the case and I recall feeling
like the vast majority of Americans. Hey, our phone service is
dependable as it is, why change?
Greene once observed that the telephone industry grew up in the
copper wire days when it was a natural monopoly, and that when
microwaves made it possible to bypass the wooden pole network,
the monopoly could not last.
He said himself that his main contribution in the case was to
require the parties to submit statements of contentions and proof –
of their claims and the evidence they had to support them – that
he insisted be progressively whittled down. Greene felt this
process is what shaved years off of the trial. After the 11 months,
a settlement was suddenly reached over the Christmas holidays –
and it was announced on January 8, 1982. [As if on cue, a brutal
cold wave hit the Midwest, Jan. 9-17, killing 261 people,
seriously].
AT&T agreed to divest itself of its 22 Bell Telephone operating
systems. The settlement then split the company into seven
regional ones and the breakup was completed on January 1, 1984.
Customers, initially, were far from happy. There were countless
complaints about complicated new bills and the need to choose
from a confusing array of long-distance companies. But Greene
was convinced that the right outcome had been achieved.
Of the constant complaints he was to hear, Greene said, “Most of
the time I don”t react at all because you cannot possibly persuade
people that what they have firmly in mind is not so. I am
perfectly content in my own view that the breakup was a good
thing. It brought competition into a field where there hadn”t been
any competition and that”s the American way. Competition
brings down price and brings up quality.”
“It had exactly that effect. The rates, particularly long-distance
rates, are way down. Even the local rates, although initially they
were up, have since decreased. So far as quality is concerned,
many, many things that have come in since then were not there
when AT&T had a monopoly.”
Federal district judge Stanley Sporkin adds that Greene”s work
was “one of the great decisions of all time, an important part of
the technological revolution we”re now in.”
Sporkin says that “Without the breakup, the U.S. would now
have a rudimentary telephone system without cellular phones,
caller I.D. and a host of other options, and competition that has
brought long-distance rates for millions down to pennies a
minute.”
But today you”ll still find many who felt that the old AT&T was a
model provider of efficient, dependable service. I guess I”m one
of them. But yes, clearly we are seeing more innovation than we
would have otherwise.
Greene”s big disappointment was the fact that the case was settled
before he could issue a final ruling. “I felt it would have been
kind of nice to write a major antitrust opinion.” Though to be
fair, it was Greene”s voluminous rulings during the case that really
led to such a relatively quick settlement.
And, as proud as Greene is, “It is not the sort of thing I want
written on my tombstone, for it”s not the only thing I ever did in
life.”
Very true. Greene also handled the prominent case of John
Poindexter, national security adviser to President Reagan.
Poindexter was charged with lying to Congress about the Iran-
Contra mess. It was Greene who ordered Reagan, then out of
office, to be a witness, the first time a president was compelled to
testify on matters involving his own administration.
Footnote: On September 20, 1995, AT&T announced that it
would split into 3 separate companies in what would be the
largest dismantling of a corporation in U.S. history. Two days
later, Turner Broadcasting System merged with Time Warner
creating the world”s largest communications company.
Sources: Various, including articles by Robert D. Hershey Jr.
(The New York Times) and Martin Weil (The Washington Post).
Brian Trumbore
