Motion Picture Commission : hearings before the Committee on Education, House of Representatives, Sixty-third Congress, second session, on bills to establish a Federal Motion Picture Commission (1978)

MOTION PICTURE COMMISSION. 153 TRAFFIC IN SOULS HAS PRIVATK EXHIBITION. About 700 people—chiefly ministers, members of women's clubs, and others interested in moral ni-'lift—r.ttoiided a private exhibition of Traffic in Souls, by invitation, at the Americ;!n ;\lusic Hall, this city, Wednesday, April 15. This subject by the Universal has been refused a permit by the board of cens(>rs, and pressure is bein^ exerted to have it i)assed. At the end of the fifth reel, cards wore passed about and those present were asked to vole on whether or not they believed the censor board should reverse its decision and permit the [jrodnction of the white-slave film in Chicaso. Only 356 availed themselves of the privilege and only 37 of them voted no. The man- agement seemed j)leased with the result and announced it would acain s?ek a permit from the censorship board. "The film is an exagjieiated view of red-light life, but well lu'oduced and with absolutely no suggestiveness," says the Chicago Tribune, in a review. " Those who came to be shoclved were disappointed. There isn't a shock in the entire six reels. There are plenty of thrills, however, and the remarkable work of De-t tective Burke, who, single-handed, raids a bagnio, rescues any number of ' white slaves,' and arrests the 'slavers,' roused the house to violent hand-clnpjMng. " Considerable sjtace is devoted to the various methods of luring girls to the underworld—at railroad stations, whr.rves, and city shops. Aside from this warning to unsophisticated feminine moving picture fans, the film has no special mission other than furnishing good entertainment as a well-put-on melodrama." Dr. Chase. It should be noted that the vote taken upon the picture was at the end of the fifth reel and not at the end of the picture. About half of the audience did not vote. In all probability tlie scene of immoral dancing was not produced at this exhibition. This difference in opinion and judgment upon Traffic in Souls may not convince the committee that the film was a hopelessly bad one and should not have been produced; even if it had been very much modified. But I think it ought to convince the committee that sex plays ought not to be produced before miscellaneous audiences, until they have been inspected, modified, and licensed by an official board of well-trained experts. Traffic in Souls was especially satisfactory to the New York City police, because it represents the police as efficiently dealing with prostitution, and as always ready to do all they can to destroy the white slave traffic. It also represents the reformer as the one who is secretly receiving the profits of houses of prostitution. I desire to discuss another of these films. The Inside of the White Slave Traffic was a worse film than Traffic in Souls. How- ever, it had the support of a number of very wealthy, cultured, and trained people in NeAv York who said it was absolutely good. It Avas submitted to one of our judges by an application for injunc- tion to restrain the police, and he rejected it. He said that any film which depicted the inside of a house of prostitution was bad and was contrary to law. He would not grant the injunction. Then it was carried before a jury and the jury condemned it in toto. XoAv, they had taken that film to the National Board of Censorshij* and asked them for their approval. They examined it a number of times, and the author says, according to the superintendent of crime, that they, were about to approve it when the general outcry became such that they changed their minds. At any rate the picture was shown in New York, and the point that I want to make is this: Did they make an agreement before they exhibited the film to the National Board of Censorship, that they would abide by their decision? The Rev. Mr. Carter told us that they were actually a board of censor-