The publication event of the decade

Censorship and fame

White Collar Crime was over 20 years in the making with Sutherland beginning data collection for this book in 1928 [3]. Just prior to publication the legal counsel for Sutherland’s publisher, the Dryden Press, insisted that the names of the 70 corporations studied be deleted. The publisher feared law suits stemming from reference to this as white-collar crime since most of the corporations had not technically been convicted of crimes. Indiana University also demanded deletions since it feared that the book would alienate “wealthy business contributors” ([3]:x).

Even with these deletions the book became a classic and was responsible for adding “white-collar crime to the American vocabulary” ([3]:xiii). The book was the “highlight of the 1940s in criminology,” and was regarded by leading writers in the field as “the most important contribution” made in that decade ([3]:xxviii) and it remained in print for over 30 years.

Sutherland’s book contained chapters on restraint of trade, discriminatory rebates, infringement of patents, trademarks and copyrights, misrepresentation in advertising, unfair labor practices, financial manipulations, offenses of power and light firms, and war crimes. Sutherland explained that this last offense type contained many of the other offenses when committed during time of war.

Sutherland ([31]:234) wrote that the “data at hand suggest that white collar crime has its genesis in the same general process as other criminal behavior, namely, differential association.” Differential association includes diffusion of illegal practices among firms and isolation from definitions unfavorable to such illegal practices. According to Sutherland, differential association also involves social disorganization in the form of a lack of ethical standards or a conflict in such standards.

Sutherland ([31]:260) argued that immigration, poor education and broken homes have nothing to do with these offenses and that psychological problems have no bearing on these crimes. Yet ironically it can be argued that Sutherland’s theory is more psychological or social psychological than truly sociological. Sutherland observed that the size of a firm has no impact on the levels of corporate crime and only noted in passing that the position of a firm in the economic structure determined its “opportunity and need for violations of the law.” This line of reasoning stressing opportunity and need seemed promising for a new research direction but Sutherland died suddenly in 1950 [3]. It seems likely that if Sutherland had lived he would have continued to use the rich data source that he and his students had spent decades compiling and would have had more to say about corporate crime opportunities.

The uncut version appears after 34 years

For the next three decades the Sutherland white-collar crime files containing the names of corporate offenders were housed at the Lilly Library at Indiana University and sealed by university order. Prior to his death, Sutherland “had looked into the question of when the statute of limitations would protect him from liability. It proved to be 1953” ([3]:xi). This implies that Sutherland was looking ahead to the day when he could name corporate offenders. While Sutherland had died in 1950, “by 1953 McCarthyism was rampant” ([3]:xi) and it would prove to be another three decades before criminologists would refocus on this data source. The 1983 uncut version named the corporations with various numbers of offenses of all types, as well as how many were criminal as opposed to civil offenses. The editors of this version made no revision to the focus and tone of Sutherland’s book. Their task was simply to restore the material that Sutherland had been forced to delete and they treated this monumental book with all of the respect it deserved.

Corporate rankings

The uncut version of the book shows the identity of the leading corporate offenders. Thirty-one corporations had between 13 and 50 total adverse decisions with Armour and Swift at the top. These meatpackers were followed closely in rankings by auto manufacturers General Motors (GM) and Ford, as well as the merchandisers Sears and Montgomery Ward. At the other end of this array of leading offenders were raw materials providers Alcoa (14), DuPont (14), and Allied Chemical (13). At the very bottom of corporate offenders we find disparate examples such as Pittsburgh Coal (1), American Radiator (2), International Shoe (3), and United Fruit (5).

While the types of industries at times cluster, there is internal industry variation in the total number of offenses. Alcoa, for example, had only 14 violations while U.S. Steel had 25. Ford had 25 while GM had 40 offenses. Sutherland provided no explanation for these patterns, and since these numbers seem inconclusive one can only speculate on their meaning.

War crimes

Sutherland wrote a chapter about war crimes that appeared in both editions of his book. In the uncut version, Sutherland’s data provide both a separate ranking and narrative to describe these events. His ranking of war crimes in this uncut version includes only 12 of the 70 firms with variation of only one to four offenses. Given the scant number of firms and offenses this ranking is less persuasive than the ranking involving all corporations. That said, Anaconda and Armour are the leaders with four decisions each. The narrative in this chapter describes violations of special war regulations, tax evasion, restraint of trade on war materials, maintaining competitive positions, violations of embargoes and neutrality, and treason.

Violations of special war regulations occurred when Bethlehem Steel refused to make ships during World War I unless they were paid a bonus. The government “was forced to accept this contract in order to secure ships” ([32]:177). The Federal Trade Commission found that leading meat packers had “attained their dominant position primarily as a result of unfair practices and illegal methods” ([32]:175). During WWI an executive of Armour admitted selling stale beef to the military. U.S. Steel “faked” tests on its wartime steel products, delivering to the government 26,000 tons of inferior steel.

Tax evasion during WWI occurred when Andrew Mellon, the primary stockholder in Alcoa, attempted to avoid paying much of the firm’s federal taxes by claiming far more wartime expenses than allowed by statute. Mellon was especially successful at this while serving as the Secretary of the Treasury during four administrations.

Restraint of trade during WWI was illustrated by secret letters exchanged by DuPont executives. These letters demonstrate that the corporation was selling gunpowder in the U.S. for nearly 25% more than in Europe [32].

Maintaining competitive positions was illustrated by Alcoa hoarding raw materials during WWII, which led to their “monopoly on aluminum” ([32]:185).

Violation of embargoes was illustrated by DuPont, which in violation of law, traded in munitions during wartime with Japan. “In other words, the DuPonts felt less embarrassment in violating an American embargo than in breaking business relations with a Japanese corporation” ([32]:188).

Finally, Sutherland argues that the DuPonts were involved in “treason” ([32]:188) when the firm agreed to report to a German corporation the “quantities and types of powder purchased by the United States government” and to pass on any improvements in powder manufacturing invented by the U.S. Army or Navy. Lammot DuPont’s own words speak volumes: “When the war is over, it will be a buyer’s market again. But this is a seller’s market. They want what we’ve got. Good! Make them pay the right price for it” ([32]:190). Lammot DuPont is quoted on how to win WW II including crushing unions and reducing taxes on corporations and the wealthy while increasing taxes on workers and “by destroying any and all government agencies that stand in the way of free enterprise” ([32]:191).

Sutherland’s perspective on war crimes

Sutherland gave considerable attention to corporate misbehavior committed during time of war that especially seemed to raise his ire:

The utility corporations for two generations or more have engaged in organized propaganda to develop favorable sentiments. They devoted much attention to the public schools in an effort to mold the opinion of children. Perhaps no groups except the Nazis have paid so much attention to indoctrinating the youth of the land with ideas favorable to a special interest, and it is doubtful whether the Nazis were less bound by considerations of honesty in their propaganda ([31]:210).

In 1942 the head of the Hoosier Motor Club in Indianapolis urged its members to contact their congressional representatives to ask for a delay in national gas rationing. Sutherland shot off a letter to him and argued that he was placing “personal interest ahead of national interest” ([3]:xv). Now Sutherland had a specific target for his anger.

This is an effort to interfere with the prosecution of the war and is subversive. I feel that the government is entirely justified in sending the F.B.I. to investigate you. They may find that your action is directed from Berlin, or that they may find that it is merely selfish interest in your own welfare; the effects are the same.

In another letter to this executive Sutherland added “all the literature you are distributing will encourage the black markets and crookedness which you so freely predict” ([3]:xvi). This was extraordinary for this scholar was known as “soft-spoken . . . who knew how to keep his feelings and personality from intruding into the discussion” ([3]:xv). When he was considering corporate war crimes, charges of collaboration with the Nazis were never far from the surface in Sutherland’s exchanges.

Research problem

If Sutherland was unusually energized by war crimes it seems appropriate to seek the sources of this concern in the files he collected. We searched Sutherland’s files for corporate misbehavior during wartime allowing us to give a full account of what he knew of such corporate war crimes. We then compared this with what is now known from other sources about offenses that occurred during WWII. Information in Sutherland’s files that have no citations was still used and appears without independent attribution.

During the decades that Sutherland worked on this book he amassed thousands of pages that include hand-written lists of court and administrative decisions, reports of Congressional hearings and newspaper articles on corporate abuses. We now possess in excess of 5,000 pages of documents form the Lilly Library, courtesy of the library staff. This has enabled us to move forward from an individualistic analysis of each corporation to consideration of the industrial sector and the type of “opportunity” involved.

After reviewing all of the documents among the 70 corporations there are three categories of industry that can be distinguished in Sutherland’s files of corporate war crimes: merchandisers of finished products including food and beverage processors and distributors, manufacturers, and corporations selling raw materials. The information was perfectly filed in folders for each corporation and in turn placed in alphabetic order reflecting the great care that Sutherland took in organizing this information.

In the Geis and Goff edition of the Sutherland book (1983) major merchandisers include Woolworth, Kresge, Montgomery Ward, Sears Roebuck, Marshall Field, Macy & Company and Gimbel as well as food and beverage processors and distributors such as Swift, Wilson, Armour, A&P, Borden and United Fruit. The manufacturers include such notables as Eastman Kodak, Ford, General Electric (GE), GM, Pittsburgh Plate Glass, U.S. Steel and Bethlehem Steel. There are also corporations providing raw materials including Allied Chemical and Dye, Alcoa, Anaconda Copper, DuPont, Pittsburgh Coal and U.S. Rubber.

We examine the two firms that topped the war crimes’ ranking, Anaconda and Armour, plus four additional firms, U.S. Steel, Alcoa, Bethlehem Steel and DuPont, highlighted in the war crimes chapter narrative. Since the rankings and narrative seemed contradictory, we next searched all the Sutherland files for flagrant corporate misbehavior and found five additional firms: Montgomery Ward, Sears, Ford, GM, and GE. Finally, to compare Sutherland’s files with what is now known about corporate war crimes during WWII we selected six additional firms on the basis of their abundant misbehavior and diversity including IBM, International Telephone and Telegraph (ITT), Standard Oil, Eastman Kodak, the Chase Bank and Coca Cola.

Leading corporate war criminals found in Sutherland’s files

Sutherland’s files contain the activities of two giant American merchandisers, Sears and Montgomery Ward, as well as meatpacking power, Armour. During WWI the president of Sears was appointed to the War Industries Board to head the division that purchased leather goods for the U.S. government [13]. A congressional investigating committee found that these supplies were purchased by Sears’ president at higher prices and at lower quality than available in Europe. These purchases were made from American dealers and manufacturers with whom he had business relations as head of the large mail-order house. Personal profit appears to have been more important than doing the best for the U.S. military.

The U.S. filed suit against Montgomery Wards (Wards) when the corporation refused to allow a union vote as required by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) under wartime regulations because the company made goods required by the military. The president of the company was carried out of his office by Army police to allow this vote to move forward [20] but was allowed to return to control as soon as a union vote was completed [21]. The workers’ vote selected union representation.

Federal authorities soon seized another of the corporation’s facilities for the continued defiance by Wards management [22]. On June 15, 1944 Wards released a long statement of protest to a special investigating committee of the U.S. House of Representatives arguing that this policy was both “unfair” and “illegal.” While Wards management was backed by its stockholders [10], the courts were unanimous in support of the federal action [23].

Even after this experience, management refused to allow union officials to operate on their premises and the Army again seized the main company offices [41]. Shortly Wards’ workers voted to strike because even after the company lost its case before the Supreme Court, management still refused to cooperate with the union [24]. The Army then took control of the company to guarantee retroactive pay increases to union workers [12]. In an open letter to its employees published in newspapers, management explained that they refused to honor a closed shop in order to provide for “liberty and freedom” [4]. Soon the company was found guilty of “union busting” by an NLRB report due to its spying on and firing of employees for union activity [25]. An arrogant management obviously considered minimizing labor power and costs as good for business.

For most of its history Armour concealed its ownership of meatpacking plants that it had purchased in all parts of the United States. This protected it from anti-trust suits and served to keep its taxes at lower rates enjoyed by smaller firms. Profits increased sevenfold during WWII [26]. Even during the depths of the Great Depression in 1933 board members received US$100,000 per year [14]. And “During WWII Armour was charged with violation of price ceilings” (Sutherland files). In 1944, the U.S. Supreme Court held that Armour hourly workers were entitled to overtime pay if required to wait in the plant for additional work [11]. After the war Armour was convicted of forcing customers to purchase foods they did not want in order to receive meat and butter shipments [27].

Each of these firms in their own unique manner was following the DuPont dictum of maximizing wartime corporate profits at the expense of Americans.

Maximizing profits by limiting materials

According to the Sutherland files, U.S. Steel was accused of “violating priority regulations by holding large quantities of steel in storage for civilian customers.” But the Sutherland files also contained abundant evidence on Alcoa. The U.S. government charged that Alcoa controlled all of the U.S. aluminum production [37]. In 1941, Alcoa began refusing to make deliveries of ore to Reynolds for aluminum processing [38]. Due to the restriction of production, prices were high and the amount of aluminum was low—less than a third of that produced by Germany. To ease this problem the government planned to build plants and lease them to producers [15]. According to a government investigation, Alcoa concealed its role in contributing to this scarcity of aluminum from the American public [17]. At the recommendation of the Secretary of War the government decided to refrain from prosecution of Alcoa for anti-trust violations until war’s end [6]. Finally, in 1945, the courts ruled that Alcoa was indeed a monopoly [42].

Maximizing profits by limiting production

Sutherland’s files contain a variety of documents on profit maximaiztion. When GE and Krupp (in Nazi Germany) signed an agreement tungsten carbide jumped from US$48 per pound to US$453 per pound [28]. Controlling production in this manner was profitable for business on both sides of the military divide. GE paid royalties to the Nazis on every pound produced, thereby helping the German economy, and they informed the Nazis exactly how much the U.S. government was using in its build-up for war. GE was fined only US$20,000.

“For more than a year (during WWII in the face of the U-boat menace) the steel industry refused to expand its facilities on the grounds that expansion was not necessary,” presumably in the interest of maximizing profits. “Charges were made in 1942 that American Steel and Wire Company, subsidiary of U.S. Steel, had conspired with Anaconda Wire and Cable Co. and the General Electric Co. to fix prices on US$50,000,000 worth of cable for the U.S. Navy. . . . The companies made a plea of nolo contendere and the court imposed a fine on each company” (Sutherland Files). They were fined a total of US$5,000.

General Motors resisted conversion to wartime production as long as possible. Until 1942 it made autos for “pleasure” even though manpower and materials were needed for war production [7]. The firm persisted in making replacement parts for civilian vehicles until finally forced to change by order of the War Production Board.

Henry Ford fought and delayed government plans to build employee housing near his Willow Run, Michigan plant fearing it would devalue his property. He also allegedly feared that it would jeopardize the Republican hold on the district and diminish the influence of the KKK and Coughlinites in the area [18]. Ford is well known for his opposition to the war against Nazi Germany. In addition, during WWII Ford “was very slow in converting from production of automobiles for civilians to production for war purposes.” And “Ford refused to make airplanes for English use” (Sutherland files).

Inferior production

In the case of General Motors, Sutherland reported on “Graft in airplane contracts in World War I.” The U.S. government ordered 3,940 airplanes with Lincoln motors at the approximate cost of a billion dollars but due to improper ignition systems this led to “inefficiency of the results” (Sutherland files). Ford was criticized for the enormous profits the company made during WWI. A specific case of this involved the Eagle Boats. Ford had a contract to build 200 of these crafts at US$20,000 each. The U.S. government built the plant for this production at a cost of US$3,500,000. The sweetheart deal was that the plant could only be used by Ford after the war. “The first boat, when launched, leaked so badly it had to be rushed back to the pier to prevent it from sinking, and it was not repaired until 1 week before the armistice. None of the boats were prepared in time for action” (Sutherland files).

Anaconda was tried and convicted of sending “faulty wire to battlefields” [19, 9]. Ultimately, the firm and two of its officers were fined US$2,000 each with prison terms for the officers suspended. Some criticized the sentences as too lenient [9].

The Sutherland file on U.S. Steel and Bethlehem Steel reads: “Profiteering in World War I. The various secretaries of the Navy for many years had protested against the high price of armor plate.” U.S. Steel “sold defective armor plate to the U.S. Navy and also defective guns; some of the guns blew up and 147 sailors and marines were killed.” The corporation also produced defective armor during the Spanish American War according to a special government investigative committee. As noted by Geis and Goff [3]:181, in 1943, the corporation was indicted for concealing and destroying records of ship plate tests. Ultimately, the firm’s head admitted that the tests were faked [8]. Bethlehem Steel also produced faulty armor for guns that exploded and killed American military personnel. A U.S. House investigation in 1894 found that the manufacturer had concealed the defective nature of their product (Sutherland files).

Favoring the enemy

Sutherland’s files include a PM article [28] published after WWII revealing a cartel between the German corporation Krupp and GE that had begun as early as the 1920s. This agreement limited American manufacture of products such as tungsten carbide used in cutting steel. GE honored this agreement even during WWII [40].

In the build-up immediately prior to WWII Bethlehem Steel was still trading with Japan in violation of a U.S. embargo [16]. Labor leaders opposed such shipments to no avail.

After WWI the DuPont Corporation bought plants from the government and tore them down to limit competition in powder production. Thus when WWII started there was a shortage. The DuPonts acquired stock in German powder firms and owned German subsidiaries thereby violating embargoes on shipment of munitions abroad. On some occasions DuPont sold powder to foreign governments at lower prices than to the United States government. Pierre DuPont argued that, “We cannot assent to allowing our patriotism to interfere with our duties as trustees” of the corporation [31]. Some leaders of the Army and Navy took positions with DuPont after their military retirement. Traditionally, the DuPont family made contributions to both political parties but after the New Deal they were all Republican. They refused to sell their trade secrets to other firms in the United States but not to foreign firms.

Approximately 60 years since Sutherland’s death more has been learned about the American corporate collaboration with the Nazis. The leaders of these firms undoubtedly did their best to conceal their misbehavior. Some of the most revealing research was not completed until the 21st century (see e.g., [1, 29]).

Trading with the enemy

Sutherland’s files contained no information on Coca Cola. Only in more recent years has the firm been identified as trading with the enemy. By the late 1920s nearly every soda fountain in the U.S. served Coca Cola [29]. Ray Powers, an American, established a Coca Cola subsidiary bottling franchise in Germany in 1929. While Coke sales in the U.S. dropped significantly during the depression, sales boomed in Germany. Coke “did business with both sides during World War II” ([29]:iv). Coke established bottling plants wherever there were American military forces, and simultaneously the firm followed Hitler’s lead into Nazi-occupied territories. The firm maximized its profits by following consumers among the Allies and Axis powers who could not rely on clean water in war-ravaged areas. Through it all, Coca Cola was able to protect its secret formula.

Coke sponsored the 1936 Nazi Olympics where Hitler and Goebbels had a special venue to display their racist propaganda—an opportunity not available to other merchandisers. Despite devastating Allied bombing raids, the German Coke Company remained profitable through most of the war, and Ray Powers continued to receive royalties on all German sales throughout the war years [29]. While an American firm providing soft drinks to Nazis may seem like a trivial example of wartime corporate crime, it provides an example of how such linkages develop.

“Henry Ford before and during the war oversaw the production of hundreds of thousands of vehicles for the Third Reich” [36]. When U.S. forces invaded Europe they discovered that the enemy was driving trucks manufactured by Ford and GM and flying planes made by GM, just as was true of Allied forces [45]. Providing vehicles for both sides was profitable for business. As late as the spring of 1943, GM in Stockholm was still trading with the enemy [5]. Higham ([5]:98) found that prior to Pearl Harbor, Henry Ford was asked by German authorities not to ship badly needed motors to “a beleaguered Britain that urgently needed them.”

Banking with the enemy

The Chase National Bank allowed Nazis in the U.S., who were approved by the German government, to purchase marks with dollars at a considerable discount [5]. The bank forwarded to the German government the assets and background information on 10,000 Nazi sympathizers in the U.S. and the bank directors made US$25 million available for these transactions. As a result there was a rush on German marks. During WWII the bank officers in the U.S. routinely transferred American dollars to the German government through South American banks. To assure the Germans of loyalty toward the Nazi cause during WWII Chase bank officers in Paris refused to release funds belonging to their Jewish customers even prior to a corresponding German government order [5]. The Nation [34] reported that “Chase seized bank accounts and safe-deposit boxes from Jewish customers in France and did not return or properly account for them after the war.” There is nothing inconsistent in finding that a major bank that tied together the finances of other American corporations would be involved in war crimes.

Giving the Nazis American technology

The Sutherland files contain no materials on the special technological sophistication of American corporate war criminals, and his list of 70 large corporations included no oil companies. Yet, our search identified some war crimes in this industry.

Standard Oil supplied significant military secrets to Nazi Germany, yet refused to give this information to the U.S. Navy [39]. The Standard Oil technology for synthetic rubber, oil and fuels such as ethyl lead provided much needed information to keep German tanks, trucks and planes running [33]. Higham [5] found that Standard Oil shipped fuel to the Nazis through Switzerland, showing that banking and oil used similar tactics to circumvent prohibitions on trading with the enemy.

To preserve its market position Eastman Kodak traded with Nazi Germany long after America entered the war. It used slave laborers to manufacture detonators as well as other military hardware [35]. Undoubtedly, Kodak’s American executives knew how the Third Reich would use this scientific information.

During WWII ITT made contributions to the Nazis through its German subsidiaries [33]. Higham ([5]:98) also noted that “ITT’s German companies continued to function under New York management” during this time. ITT provided the technology that allowed the Germans to drop bombs on British and American forces and the technology to “improve robot bombs that devastated London” ([5]:xv). After WWII, ITT collected millions from the U.S. for having destroyed some of its German plants. But both GE and ITT plants largely escaped allied bombing during WWII and due to American ownership were hit only incidentally [33].

Black [1] explains how IBM’s punch-card sorting machines facilitated the identification of Jews and ultimately the Holocaust. Thousands of IBM punch card machines were distributed in Germany and German-occupied Europe and billions of punch cards were produced in these areas each war year. “IBM was in some ways bigger than the war. Both sides could not afford to proceed without the company’s all-important technology. Hitler needed IBM. So did the Allies” ([1]:348). In addition to aid in carrying out the Holocaust the machines were used in all phases of commercial and industrial activity. So reliant were both sides in the war on these machines that “no matter who won, IBM would prosper” ([1]:22).

Using these machines the German census identified Jews and barred them from certain occupations, and later the machines helped carry out mass evictions of Jews from their homes. The German census asked if any grandparents were Jewish and identified respondents as Christians or Jews. The German railways were organized using this system to transport Jews to their deaths at concentration camps. Every death camp had a myriad of sorters, tabulators and printers and ultimately the cause of death was accurately machine recorded as either through natural causes, suicide or execution.

Conclusion

Major merchandisers typically were not prominent corporate war criminals. No matter how large, powerful, or duplicitous merchandisers could typically be replaced by a competitor. Coca Cola, however, had a unique product much in demand by American and Axis forces. Manufacturers seemed to be removed from competition since they often owned plants with unique production capabilities. Ford and GM traded with the enemy making military vehicles for the Nazis. ITT, Standard Oil, and Kodak created and forwarded new technology to the Nazis that killed American military personnel. IBM provided scientific information that contributed significantly to the Holocaust.

Technology levels seem to provide an explanation for the gravity of the war crimes committed. It is technology in a given industrial sector that provides the opportunity for grievous offenses. The highly vaunted Nazi science was apparently overrated by virtue of Nazi propaganda [44]. Its successes were due in part to the duplicity of American corporations, not merely a consequence of the genius of German scientists. Race science and pseudo-science were prominent in Nazi Germany and this made much of the German scientific community ineffectual [1]. In addition to the purging of Jewish scientists, political convention often conflicted with scientific innovation.

Sutherland’s Differential Association Theory accurately explains the motivations of corporate leaders. The executives of these firms were all attempting to maximize profits during time of war. Many commercial giants had extensive corporate holdings abroad that made cooperation among branches seem logical to many executives. They all seemed to agree and were isolated from what they likely saw as parochial patriotism. What appears more significant is the differential “opportunity” to commit crime ([31]:260) that varied significantly from one firm to the next even within the same industrial sector. The specific opportunities for crime included squeezing American government, consumers and workers, limiting materials, limiting production, inferior production, trading with the enemy, favoring the enemy, and providing scientific information.

Although Sutherland had a reputation as a mild-mannered scholar, his ire was clearly raised by abuses of power that he uncovered in addition to white-collar crime. Sutherland repeatedly claimed that his sole interest in studying corporate crime was to reform criminology and not society [2]. For example, in his 1940 Presidential address to the American Sociological Society he argued that this research was important “for the purpose of developing the theories of criminal behavior, not for the purpose of muckraking or of reforming anything except criminology” ([30]:1). This scientific dispassion clearly did not apply to corporate war crimes. Had Sutherland known about the wartime behavior of Kodak, ITT, and IBM it is likely that he would have created a new and more extreme category beyond the “treason” of DuPont. Genocide is one likely candidate.

Sutherland’s collection of files contained information on corporations, save one. There is a single file devoted to the activities of an individual, the late Andrew Mellon. Likely, Sutherland’s interest was peaked by Mellon’s stunning success at war crime violations while serving for many years as Secretary of the Treasury. In that capacity Mellon had a dominant role in enforcing rules that governed his economic empire. The insider status of Mellon is reflected in recent years by firms such as Blackwater [43] and Halliburton [46] and their no-bid contracts. The challenge for a democracy is how to reduce wartime opportunities for corporate crime or to make the costs of such behavior so extreme that it will become unattractive for executives.