tends that he was, but manifestly he was not, or the curious opposition between his expectation and that of the Secretary of the Treasury and Chief of Bureau could not have occurred. And we cannot assent to the suggestion that he "was by coercion prevented" from making a demand "in terms" by his subordinate position. How long must we suppose such coercion lasted and that he could have permitted a misunderstanding of his purpose? Six years passed, and the Chief of Bureau with whom the negotiations were made went out of office; another succeeded. No demand was made of either for compensation. Further time passed, and other Chiefs of Bureau succeeded. There was a succession of Secretaries of the Treasury; no demand was made of any of them. His first demand was the petition in this case, over fourteen years from his first interview with the Secretary of the Treasury. This delay cannot be overlooked or interpreted favorably to appellant's contention. He sues for $102,600, and this does not include the royalties that he contends he was entitled to for the first six years the device was used. He claims a royalty of twenty-five cents a day on an average of two hundred machines—that is, $50 a day. He was an employé of the Government at a modest salary, and we cannot conceive there was no inducement in $50 a day to an explicit demand of his rights, or that he was willing to wait, or felt himself coerced to wait, for their realization for fourteen years, and even to lose compensation for six years by the operation of the statute of limitations. The rights of the Government are obvious. The contention of the appellant forces on it a liability that it might not have taken. It was given no election of the terms upon which it would use the register, or whether it would use it at all. Of course, this argument is based on the fact that there was no coming together of the minds of the parties, or, as expressed by the findings of the Court of Claims, that "it was supposed and understood" by the officers of the Government that appellant "would neither expect nor demand remuneration." And this fact distinguishes the case from Mc

Keever v. United States, 14 C. Cl. 396, affirmed by this court; also from United States v. Lynah, 188 U. S. 445, and the other cases cited by appellant.

MR. JUSTICE PECKHAM dissents.

Judgment affirmed.

BOARD OF TRADE OF THE CITY OF CHICAGO v. CHRISTIE GRAIN AND STOCK COMPANY.

CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT.

L. A. KINSEY COMPANY v. BOARD OF TRADE OF THE CITY OF CHICAGO.

CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT.

Nos. 224, 280. Argued April 20, 24, 25, 1905.-Decided May 8, 1905.

The Chicago Board of Trade collects at its own expense quotations of prices offered and accepted for wheat, corn and provisions in its exchange and distributes them under contract to persons approved by it and under certain conditions. In a suit brought by it to restrain parties from using the quotations obtained and used without authority of the Board, defendants contended that as the Board of Trade permitted, and the quotations related to, transactions for the pretended buying of grain without any intention of actually receiving, delivering or paying for the same, that the Board violated the Illinois bucket shop statute and there were no property rights in the quotations which the court could protect, and that the giving out of the quotations to certain persons makes them free to all. Held, that Even if such pretended buying and selling is permitted by the Board of Trade it is entitled to have its collection of quotations protected by the law, and to keep the work which it has done to itself, nor does it lose its property rights in the quotations by communicating them to certain persons, even though many, in confidential and contractual relations

198 U. S.

Argument for Board of Trade.

to itself, and strangers to the trust may be restrained from obtaining and using the quotations by inducing a breach of the trust.

A collection of information, otherwise entitled to protection, does not cease to be so because it concerns illegal acts, and statistics of crime are property to the same extent as other statistics, even if collected by a criminal who furnishes some of the data.

Contracts under which the Board of Trade furnishes telegraph companies with its quotations, which it could refrain from communicating at all, on condition that they will only be distributed to persons in contractual relations with, and approved by, the Board, and not to what are known as bucket shops, are not void and against public policy as being in restraint of trade either at common law or under the Anti-Trust Act of July 2, 1890.

THE facts are stated in the opinion.

Mr. Henry S. Robbins for petitioner in No. 224 and respondent in No. 280:

It is not a good defense to these suits that most of the transactions, out of which the quotations arise are gambling transactions. The violation by a plaintiff of a criminal statute of one State does not debar him from maintaining suits to protect his property in a Federal court in another State. Penal laws do not reach, in their effect, beyond the jurisdiction of where they are established. Commonwealth v. Green, 17 Massachusetts, 540, 674; Logan v. United States, 144 U. S. 263, 303; State v. Pelican Ins. Co., 127 U. S. 265, 289; The Antelope, 10 Wheat. 66, 123; Folliott v. Ogden, 1 H. Blacks. 123, 135; Fuller v. Berger, 120 Fed. Rep. 274. And see also City of Chicago v. Stock Yards, 164 Illinois, 224, 238; Bateman v. Fargason, 4 Fed. Rep. 32; Ansley v. Wilson, 50 Georgia, 421; Langdon v. Templeton, 66 Vermont, 173; 1 Pom. Eq. $399.

Petitioner's misconduct, if any, respecting the transactions upon its exchange, prejudicially affects these respondents only as it does the public at large.

The general dissemination of these quotations is conceded to be highly beneficial to legitimate commerce. Respondents' answer so admits. So the Illinois Supreme Court has also held. Stock Exchange v. Board of Trade, 127 Illinois, 153.

Argument for Board of Trade.

198 U. S.

The Board of Trade's conduct with respect to the quotations, is not at all reprehensible. It gives them to all persons desiring them for lawful purposes, and only withholds them, as it lawfully may, from bucket shops.

As to the Illinois bucket shop law, see Soby v. People, 134 Illinois, 66. It does not apply to exchanges.

Market news, whose dissemination is helpful to commerce, is not to be deemed infected with illegality or beyond judicial protection, because the owner of this news maintains an exchange, where parties to most of the transactions it records do not contemplate actual delivery. The existence of a property right in news depends upon its source, rather than the character or utility of the news itself. Brooks v. Martin, 2 Wall. 79; Planters' Bank v. Union Bank, 16 Wall. 483, 499.

As matter of fact it is not true that most of the trades, whose prices these quotations record, are gambling transactions.

As to the principle and legality of the systems of offsetting or elimination of trades which will be found in most commercial exchanges, see Clews v. Jamieson, 182 U. S. 461; Lehman v. Feld, 37 Fed. Rep. 852; Irwin v. Williar, 110 U. S. 499; Bibb v. Allen, 110 U. S. 500.

The Board of Trade should not be held responsible for what gambling there is upon its exchange, and on that account be deprived of its right to sue to protect its property in its quotations.

There is a property right in the quotations which equity will protect by injunction.

Both in England and this country market news thus distributed as are these quotations, is a species of property, which a court of equity will protect by injunction. Exchange Tel. Co. v. Gregory, L. R. (1896), 1 Q. B. 147; Dodge Co. v. Construction Co., 183 Massachusetts, 62; Kiernan v. Manhattan Tel. Co., 50 How. Pr. 194; Nat. Tel. News. Co. v. West. Un. Tel. Co., 119 Fed. Rep. 294; Illinois Com. Co. v. Cleveland Tel. Co., 119 Fed. Rep. 301; Cleveland Tel. Co. v. Stone, 105

198 U.S.

Argument for Board of Trade.

Fed. Rep. 594; Board of Trade v. Hadden-Krull Co., 103 Fed. Rep. 902; S. C., 109 Fed. Rep. 705; this case below 116 Fed. Rep. 944.

Board of Trade quotations are a species of property. Stock Exchange v. Board of Trade, 127 Illinois, 153.

That this market news is too evanescent to derive any protection from the Copyright Act, a perusal of that statute will show. Nat. Tel. News Co. v. West. Un. Tel. Co., supra; Clayton v. Stone, 2 Payne, 382; S. C., Fed. Cas. 2872.

As to the protection of literary property, apart from the statutory provisions of copyright law, see Millar v. Taylor, 4 Burr, 2303; Donaldson v. Becket, 4 Burr, 2408; Wheaton v. Peters, 8 Pet. 591; Holmes v. Hurst, 174 U. S. 82; Tompkins v. Halleck, 133 Massachusetts, 32; Palmer v. DeWitt, 47 N. Y. 532. See other cases applying the same principle to dramas, exhibition of paintings, etc. Macklin v. Richardson, Ambl. 694; Crowe v. Aiken, 2 Biss. 208; S. C., Fed. Cas. No. 3441; Albert v. Strange, 2 DeG. S. & M. 652; Turner v. Robinson, 10 Irish Ch. 121. And in the case of lectures. Abernethy v. Hutchinson, 1 Hall. & Tw. 28; Caird v. Simes, L. R. (1887) 12 H. L. 326. See also Bartlette v. Chittenden, 4 McLean, 300; S. C., Fed. Cas. No. 1082.

The contracts between the Board of Trade and the telegraph companies are not illegal and are not in restraint of trade under the common law or any state or Federal statute, and as to duty of the Board to give out the quotations see Stock Exchange v. Board of Trade, 127 Illinois, 153; and contra, Ladd v. F. C. P. & M. Co., 53 Texas, 172; Delaware R. R. Co. v. Central Co., 45 N. J. Eq. 50; State v. Ass'd Press, 159 Missouri, 424; Re Renville, 46 App. Div. N. Y. 37; Central Exch. v. Board of Trade, 196 Illinois, 396; Smith v. West. Un. Tel. Co., 84 Kentucky, 664; Bryant v. West. Un. Tel. Co., 17 Fed. Rep. 825; Bradley v. West. Un. Tel. Co., 9 Con. Law Bull. 223; 27 Am. & Eng. Ency of Law, 2d ed., 1039, 1094; Gray on Telegraphs, 19; Rev. Stat. Missouri, 1889, § 2338; Bucket Shop Statute of Illinois; State v. Bell Tel. Co., 23 Fed. Rep.