ABSTRACT
Henry Ford was involved in several famous lawsuits. None threw as much light on his character as the one brought against him in 1919 by the two Dodge brothers. In the trial, Ford revealed his convictions and his prophetic turn of mind in words all the more striking for being entirely unemotional. What Ford said made it clear that his concept of industry was in flat contradiction to that of classic capitalism and a permanent threat to it. In other words, the trial was essentially a trial of orthodoxy. Beyond the interests at stake, and they were considerable, the main purpose was to determine who was orthodox and who was heretic, whose concept of business was right and whose was wrong.
