A great Warren Buffett story:
This is a story about Warren Buffet as told by Bill Ruane at his shareholder meeting (from Outstanding Investor Digest, Volume XIV, Number 1, 1999 Patient Subscriber's Bonus Edition, p. 16 ... for subscription information see: oid.com )
--Duker
...
Warren was asked to testify by Cravath, Swaine, & Moore who was defending IBM in the government's antitrust suit. He was on the stand for two days before a very tough judge who clearly felt no warmth for IBM and was pretty outstpoken about it. And this one prosecutor said, "Mr. Buffett, you believe that everything Ben Graham said is accurate, don't you?" Warren said, "Absolutely." And the lawyer said, "Well, let me read you this definition of depreciation..." And he read this definition of depreciation, which was pertinent to the business issue that was being raised at the time, from Graham and Dodd.
The lawyer looked at Warren and said, "Do you agree with that definition?" And Warren said, "No." "Well, it's straight from Graham and Dodd." And Warren said, "What edition is that?" The prosecutor paused and said, "May I have an adjournment for a few minutes?"
And the lawyers came back the next day and they still didn't have and answer. Finally, Warren said, "I think you'll find that it was from the fifth edition -- and that particular chapter on depreciation wasn't written by Ben Graham. It was cited as having been writen by an expert on utility companies. And that happens to be the definition of this other gentleman, not Ben Graham. And I don't agree with it."
And I can still remember the judge, a hardhearted guy, just looked over the bench at Warren, "Hmmmm". And then, "Mr. Buffett, thank you." I thought he was going to ask Warren for a tip on the stock market. And you know, sometime thereafter, IBM was exonerated. I'm not saying it was due to Warren. But it was a great courtroom scene -- right out of Perry Mason ...
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