Weekly television digest (Jan-Dec 1960)

6 JANUARY 4, 1960 The FCC PROGRAM PROBE RESUMES: Some industry spokesmen will get their licks in this week as FCC’s programming inquiry resumes Jan. 5. But biggest guns — networks & NAB — ai'e due at the windup starting Jan. 25. The hearings will run this week & next, then take a week’s breather while FCC counsel Ashbi'ook Bryant & James Tierney bone up for the big finale. They hope the hearing will end this month or early in Feb. This week’s witnesses: Jan. 5 — Prof. Eric Goldman, Princeton U.; producer-playwright Rod Serling; Assn, of National Advertisers, spokesman still unidentified. Jan. 7 — Morris Novik, broadcast consultant; Advertising Federation of America, witness not named; Herman D. Kenin, pres., American Federation of Musicians; Burton Lane, pi'es., American Guild of Authors & Composers; Philip Cortney, pres., Coty Inc. Jan. 8 — Marianne B. Campbell, gen. mgr., radio WJEH, Gallipolis, 0.; Tom Chauncey, pres., KOOL-TV Phoenix; Howard B. Hayes, vp, radio WPIK Alexandria, Va.; Cecil Woodland, gen. mgr., radio WEJL Scranton. NAB is going all out, meanwhile, preparing its case. Constitutional lawyer Whitney North Seymour plans to confer with NAB officials in Washington this week, and NAB’s special 12-man task force meets Jan. 11. Seymour, a member of the Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett firm, is not only president-elect of American Bar Assn, but also chmn. of ABA’s bar-media committee on Canon 35. (The Canon prohibits the use of cameras & microphones at court trials.) Reached in Hanover, N.H., where he was vacationing, he said he had no observations on the constitutional questions involved, that “I’ve just begun really to work on the thing.” ♦ * ♦ “Nationwide expression of indignation” over quiz & payola scandals “is such that broadcasting — and TV in particular — must mend certain of its ways if it is to regain some lost respect & confidence,” FCC Chmn. Doerfer warned last week. In a year-end statement on FCC’s 25th year, he added: “Whether this can be done by moves to strengthen self-regulation without new & compelling legislation remains to be seen.” Doerfer also noted that “many voices are demanding a halt to some broadcast ‘commercials’ which, if not actually illegal, are unethical or in bad taste and are a disservice to the public.” After reviewing Commission work in 1959, Doerfer’s report concluded: “Never before in its quarter century has so much of the Commission’s time been diverted from the normal administrative process by happenings which require priority attention.” Among them: Court actions requiring “new & additional time-consuming procedures” and Congressional activity entailing “an unprecedented number” of appearances at hearings, comments on proposed legislation, special studies, etc. He called again for enactment by Congress of FCC-proposed measures to simplify & reduce FCC’s housekeeping chores. . . • “Economic injury” question in Auburn, N.Y. has been slated for hearing by the FCC Comrs. Lee & Cross dissenting. Local radio outlet WMBO had objected to the grant of WAUB on the grounds that the city couldn’t support 2 stations. The Commission then told WMBO to file a renewal application so that the body may determine who shall have the only station in town — if WMBO proves that the community can’t support-2. ... FCC FUNCTIONS DEBATED: Sen. Proxmire (D-Wis.), who has been trying for 2 years to write an FCC “ripper” bill, enlivened an otherwise polite panel discussion at a Washington convention of educators last week by demanding a tough Commission crackdown on TV & radio programming. What’s needed now is a “substantial, drastic revision” of regulations governing the broadcasting industry — perhaps by substituting an administrator-&-court system for FCC, Proxmire said. But at the same time, he added, FCC already has “the power & authority” to force stations to improve programs. He drew heated retorts from fellow-panelist FCC Chmn. Doerfer at the speech & theater convention of 4 organizations — the Speech Assn, of America, American Educational Theater Assn., National Society for the Study of Communications and National University Extension Assn. And other participants in the session on “The FCC’s Role in Broadcasting” gave Proxmire little support. Once FCC starts regulating programming, Doerfer said, “you go down a road [of censorship] from which there is no turning and no end.” And in a ringing mixed metaphor, Doerfer cautioned his audience: “Don’t get on the bandwagon that is going to pull the roof down over your heads.” And as for attacks on FCC itself by such critics as Proxmire, who had cited a N.Y. Times story quoting unnamed lawyers in protests against FCC procedures, Doerfer said: “Any anonymous charge against the FCC isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. The W'hole scandal about FCC is mostly in the minds of those who are afraid to stand up & be counted.” Congressman Backs Doerfer Rep. Avery (R-Kan.), a House Commerce communications subcommittee member, sided with Doerfer. He said it’s up to Congress to provide help to FCC (“guidelines, yes; censorship, no”) if tighter program regulation is needed. “The most convenient place to place blame” for faults, Avery said, always is FCC instead of Congress, adding: “If we give the TV industry time to grow up, it will be able to regulate itself.” Dr. David R. Mackey of Boston U. challenged Proxmire’s “meat axe” approach to FCC problems. He also asked why the industry “has not stood up a little more for its rights” to have more definite conduct guides in the Communications Act. Now the industry is subjected to Congressional “pressures” instead of clear-cut rules, Mackey said. Dr. Walter B. Emery of Michigan State U., former legal asst, to ex-FCC Chmn. Paul Walker, suggested it would be a good idea if Congress amended anti-censorship Sec. 326 of the Communications Act to permit FCC rulemaking on program standards. In an earlier session at the speech & theater convention, -delegates heard discussions of TV’s role in politics. Both Republican campaign dir. Robert Humphreys & Democratic information dir. Samuel Brightman agreed that use of hard-sell advertising gimmicks on the air won’t work in this Presidential election year. The public no longer will buy canned political presentations, they said. “Educational TV & majority taste” was discussed by Prof. William Bluem of Ohio Wesleyan U. in a panel on “persuading the TV producer to give us the kind of programs we want.” He said that the big trouble with much educational programming is that it’s “boring.” ETV needs onore. entertainment,. Bluem argued. ... .