In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants (1914)

Record Details:

Title:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants
Date:
1914
Publisher:
New York, Appeal Printing Co.
Volume:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants : record volume 5
Leaf #:
000276
Language:
English
Collection:
Early Cinema and Government & Law
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
The Museum of Modern Art Library, New York
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
These seven volumes contain the testimonies and supporting documents from the U.S. District Court's antitrust lawsuit against the Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC). Formed in 1908, the MPPC (sometimes referred to asœ"the Edison Trust" or just "the Trust") sought to control the American film industry through pooling patents and demanding that producers and exhibitors acquire licenses to those patents. Independent producers and exhibitors, who refused to license the patents, argued that the MPPC was an unlawful monopoly. In 1912 and 1913, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania heard testimonies from both MPPC members, such as Siegmund Lubin, and "Independents" who later became Hollywood moguls, such as William Fox. Ultimately, in 1915, the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which found the MPPC in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act and spelled the end for the already weakening MPPC. -- Eric Hoyt, 2012
Date Added:
September 21, 2023
Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

1 272G Thomas A. Brown, Cross Examination. The Witness: The price is the same? By Mr. Grosvenor: Q. Yes. A. You mean without regard to the kind of film and the manufacturer of it? Q. If you get a picture that is a thousand feet and ten days old and a drama, you pay the same for it whether it is a so-called Pathe, Selig or Biograph, don't you? A. I pay a certain rental each week, with the understanding that I am to receive, or I select the best manufacturers' productions, but if I did not receive some of the Vitagraph productions or some of the Selig productions, and the exchange furnished me with the Pathe, Pathe foreign, and the class of reels or pictures that naturally will not attract the public the way the Vitagraph comedies or Vitagraph two-reels would attract them, I would certainly insist upon having my service for less, — I would insist upon having the Vitagraph productions, or the better productions, and if I did not receive them, I would certainly make arrangements to get other manufacturers. Q. Do you get a daily change? A. Yes, sir. Q. How many reels do you get a day? A. Six. Q. Then in one day you have six reels of six different manufacturers? A. Oh, no; not at all. Q. Well, what have you? A. Some days we will have four reels, and some days we will have three reels of one manufacturer, in fact, on Sundays, I have made arrangements with our exchange to furnish me a Vitagraph two-reel feature, and it is understood that I am to receive that feature. Q. Then you get six reels a day, and you pay the same for each day, do you, or is your service by the week? A. The service is always by the week, as I understand the picture business. Q. Well, then, there isn't any change in price for your six reels per day, although the names of the different manufacturers change every day? A. There isn't any change — Q. (interrupting) : In the price, is there? A. In the price I am now paying, I am to receive certain manufacturers'. I am to receive all they produce, and of course I am paying that price with that understanding. If I did not receive those manufacturers' productions, the productions of those manufacturers, why, of course, as I told you before,