Broadcasting Telecasting (Jan-Mar 1960)

EDITORIALS Rigged and loaded THE following item appeared in the regular "Question Box" feature of Parade, the Sunday newspaper supplement, for Jan. 31: "Q: Robert Lishman, counsel for the House Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight, claims that key personnel in many radio stations 'have long, serious criminal records.' Is this true? — W.P., Tucson, Ariz. "A: Unfortunately, it is. Station owners are firing such personnel before station identities are revealed." If the item were true, Parade grossly underplayed it. If the item were not true, Parade's editors owe everyone in radio an apology. We'll bet an apology is in order. To begin with, Mr. Lishman has never stated, to our knowledge, that "many" stations employed persons with criminal records. He said "some" stations were involved. And if anybody has been fired from any station because the Oversight committee said he had a criminal record, we haven't heard of it. The Parade item was rigged just as thoroughly as TwentyOne was rigged. If there is a "W.P., Tucson, Ariz.," his question should have been edited to conform with facts. The answer given by Walter Scott, who conducts Parade's "Question Box," should have stated its source, if it had one. We wouldn't spend this space discussing the incident if it were not typical of a good deal of shoddy reporting about broadcasting being done by newspapers and magazines these days. It is also typical, unfortunately, of some publications which are parts of companies that also own broadcast properties. Parade is a part of the J.H. (Jock) Whitney enterprise which also owns the New York Herald-Tribune and the Corinthian radio and television stations, among other properties. The top management of that and similar organizations would do both publishing and broadcasting a service by seeing that one didn't beat the other with unfair and inaccurate reports. It's NARBA now A LESSON in congressional relations was taught last week. Harried broadcasters everywhere should take heed. Within 24 hours the subcommittee and the full Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously approved the North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement and the related Mexican treaty. One step — full Senate ratification — remains to terminate a 10-year ratification battle and to avoid another possible nightmare of wave-jumping. Why unanimous approval now against the background of repeated committee rebuffs? It was a simple case of organization and follow-through by broadcasters who knew what they were doing. Heretofore, even though the State Dept. and the FCC, as well as the Clear Channel Broadcasting Service, had urged approval, their combined efforts were not enough to offset the small group of daytimers who functioned as the Daytime Broadcasters Assn. and who made no bones about insisting upon increased hours of operation (on regional as well as clear channels) as the price for withdrawal of their opposition. FCC Comr. Rosel H. Hyde, who had negotiated both the NARBA treaty and the Mexican agreement, had steadfastly refused to compromise. He insisted upon flat ratification with no reservations, because any concessions would have thrown the treaty terms open to new negotiations with our North American neighbors. The new ingredient which swung the committee from no skepticism to unanimity was provided by the recently organized Regional Broadcasters, who stood to lose most if daytimers were permitted to operate from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., with no provision for protection. Under the leadership of Payson Hall, of Meredith, a number of regionals pitched in to advise senators of imminent disruptions in am broadcasting if the treaty was not approved. They backed up the FCC and the State Dept. It was a forthright job handled by broadcasters who, until this session, apparently did not realize the extent of their jeopardy. The lesson is notably important in these troubled times. For too many years, too many broadcasters (and this goes for advertisers and agencies, too) have been too prone to adopt the "Let George do it" approach. This is a new do-it-yourself legislative climate — or at least do it in small, effective and hard-hitting groups. What's not in a name IT WAS in March 1957 that the U.S. House of Representatives created the Legislative Oversight Subcommittee and gave it $250,000 to investigate whether the FCC and other independent agencies had strayed from their original purposes. In August 1958 the subcommittee was given $60,000 more, in March 1959 $200,000 more and recently $410,000 more — all for the same investigation. We think it is time the subcommittee started the job the House ordered it to do nearly three years ago. So far the Legislative Oversight Subcommittee has spent $487,000 and is yet to get anywhere near the central question it originally set out to answer. The money has gone for such sensations as the Richard Mack case, the Bernard Goldfine-Sherman Adams case and the television quiz scandals. These investigations served useful purposes, it must be admitted, but they did little to advance the subcommittee's original assignment. Now the subcommittee has $410,000 more to spend, and its first objective will be an investigation of payola. For all we know, this may turn out to serve a useful purpose too, but we cannot imagine how it can be of much help in determining whether the independent agencies are behaving as Congress wanted them to when it created them. Either the subcommittee ought to get going on the work it was assigned, or its name ought to be changed to something more descriptive than Legislative Oversight. On its record to date it could more properly be called the Subcommittee on Looking for Scandals Wherever They Are Handy. Drawn for BROADCASTING by Sid Hix "But I thought you took out the premium!" BROADCASTING, February 8, 1960