## Facts

- Story Parchment Company entered the vegetable parchment paper market as a new competitor.
- Paterson Parchment Paper Company and other established manufacturers allegedly combined to monopolize interstate trade in vegetable parchment and drive Story from the market.
- Story sued under the Sherman Act seeking treble damages, alleging defendants coordinated price-cutting that depressed market prices and injured Story’s business and property.
- A jury returned a verdict for Story for $65,000, with an alternative finding for defendants “if, as a matter of law,” Story could not recover.
- The district court approved the verdict and entered treble-damages judgment under the Sherman Act.
- The court of appeals vacated the judgment and ordered judgment for defendants, concluding Story failed to prove recoverable damages because the award was speculative.
- The Supreme Court granted review.

## Issues

1. Whether sufficient evidence supported submission to the jury of a conspiracy to monopolize interstate trade in vegetable parchment paper.
2. Whether Story presented sufficient evidence that defendants’ unlawful combination proximately caused injury to Story’s business and property.
3. Whether damages based on comparing actual receipts at depressed prices with receipts that would have occurred at reasonable prices absent the conspiracy were too uncertain to be recoverable.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court reversed the court of appeals and directed reinstatement of the district court’s judgment for Story, including treble damages.
- The Court held the record contained sufficient evidence of a combination or conspiracy to monopolize to support the jury’s finding.
- The Court held the evidence permitted a jury finding that defendants’ conduct proximately caused Story’s injury, and proximate cause was for the jury on this record.
- The Court rejected the view that the damages award was impermissibly speculative, holding that uncertainty in amount does not bar recovery when damages are attributable to the wrong.

## Legal Principles

- The rule against recovery of “uncertain damages” bars damages not shown to be the certain result of the wrong, not damages clearly caused by the wrong but uncertain only in amount.
- When the defendant’s wrongful conduct makes precise calculation impracticable, the plaintiff may prove the extent of damages by a just and reasonable inference even if the result is approximate.
- Uncertainty in the amount of damages is generally resolved against the wrongdoer whose conduct created the difficulty of proof.
- Proximate cause in antitrust damages may be a jury question, and a jury’s causation finding stands unless the evidence compels the opposite conclusion.

## Conclusion

The Court restored the antitrust judgment, holding that once injury from an unlawful combination is shown, damages are not defeated by imprecision in quantifying the loss, particularly when the defendants’ conduct contributed to the uncertainty.


Story Parchment Co. v. Paterson Parchment Paper Co., 282 U.S. 555 (1931)