Antitrust and Trade Regulation laws aim to promote free competition in the marketplace. Agreements or cooperative efforts by two or more entities that affects or restrains competitors is illegal under these laws. The Sherman Act makes illegal any contract, combination, or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce and makes monopolies and attempts, combinations, or conspiracies to monopolize illegal. The Clayton Act regulate price discrimination, tying and exclusive dealing contracts, stock acquisition and interlocking directorates.
Mount Carmel is the county seat of Wabash County, Illinois. At the time of the 2000 census, the city population was 7,982, while the next largest town in Wabash County is Allendale, Illinois, population 528. The city, sitting at the confluence of the Wabash River, the Patoka River and the White River, Mount Carmel borders both Gibson and Knox Counties of Indiana. A small community known informally as East Mount Carmel sits near the mouth of the Patoka River on the opposite side of the Wabash River from Mount Carmel. Mount Carmel is 5 miles (8.0 km) northeast of the Forest of the Wabash, a National Natural Landmark within Beall Woods State Park and about a mile north-northeast of one of its main employers, the Gibson Generating Station. Mount Carmel is also the home of Wabash Valley College, part of the Community College System of Eastern Illinois.