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. 175 be exhibited in any licensed pljice of amusement for pay or in connection with any business in the District of Co]uni])ia, or in any of the Territories of the United States, or any place under the juTisdiction of the United States. I ]:»resume that the District, etc., is specially mentioned because tnch State would be sovereign in this matter. Canon Chase pointed out a fact in the bill, " That films that were rejected could be shown if not for pay." That would mean disaster. The District of Columbia has more clubs in it than any other cit,y in the Union. It is a city of clubs. Now, I am as much opposed to showing innnoral, indecent, or obscene pictures in private houses as T am in public places. There should be no discrimination between the Army and Navy Club and the 5-cent theater. There should be no discrimination between the 5-cent theater and the Cosmos Club or any other club, no matter what the name of it may be. They have no right to show it, but according to this they are virtually given the power and authority to say, " We can show it under this bill; we can show it by authority of an act of Congress." I do not think that the House of Representatives w^ould ever think of putting their mark of approval upon such a proposition. Dr. Chase has also called attention to the statement that a certain fdm that the national board had passed was a film to which objec- tion had been raised. Now, if a film could pass the inspection of such a body, how many objectionable films could pass a commission of five or a representative of only one? The doctor also stated that from authentic information from Ohio, the censors at last report were rejecting 15 per cent of the reels, while earlier reports showed only S per cent, I believe. Does that not tell the destruction to which the industry is doomed by official censor- ship ? While Ohio censors have destroyed for that State one-seventh of the reels produced, have we heard of any such confiscation in any other part of the country? The reels rejected in Ohio have un- doubtedly been shoAvn in every other State hj this time, and we have rot heard of one complaint elsewhere. I find this article published in The Variety, a theatrical news- paper, in its issue of May 8, 1910: OHIO CKNSOKS IIEUINI). Cleveland, May 6. Ohio's State law which created the ];oard of censors failed to provide enough memhers of the board to carry on the work in this State. The i)resent members, who number three, will not be able to do the work in Ohio, ;ind luiless more persons are named many films will have to go uncen- sored Mrs. ]\Iaud Miller, who be.nan censoring in Clevel.-md, will have to censor 10.(»<I0 films. At the present rate she will be at the t;isk for months. At present there is only one other member of the board, IT. E. Vestal, of Ada, Ohio. He is also eiigaged in censoring in Cleveland. One position on the board is vacant. Picture exhibitors, who now are opposed to the State censorship board, are likely to comjtlain to the courts of the inefficiency of the censoring body and demand that more censors be appointed. Unless something is done to relieve are work of the present board the ex- hibitors will refuse to await the stamp of approval of the censors and will exhibit films before they ai'e passed on, being willing to run the risk for vio- lation of the State law. Lawyers declare that nothing can be done to those who exhibit uncensored films when the censorship board is unable to handle the work mapped out for it.