Broadcasting Telecasting (Apr-Jun 1961)

GOVERNMENT House ready to ram Kennedy's FCC plan REPUBLICAN FOES GET SOME STRONG ALLIES: DEMOCRATS-WHO-COUNT President Kennedy's plan to reorganize the FCC appears headed for defeat in the House of Representatives, possibly this week. Speaker Sam Rayburn (D-Tex.) has put himself on record as opposing the plan and predicting its defeat. And the influential House Regulatory Agencies Subcommittee, headed by Rep. Oren Harris (D-Ark.), is urging its rejection. With the Administration stripped of these heavy guns, observers feel it lacks the defense to withstand a concerted effort by House opponents to veto the plan. The Government Reorganization Act, under which the plan was submitted to Congress on April 27, provides that either House can block the measure if it musters a bare majority against it within 60 days. A resolution to kill the plan, introduced by Rep. Clare Hoffman (RMich.), was taken up by the House Government Operations Committee last week. And Rep. William L. Springer (R-Ill), a member of the House Regu latory Agencies Subcommittee, said Thursday that if the committee doesn't report the resolution to the floor by today (May 22), either he or Rep. Hoffman will try to pry it loose for a vote. The Kennedy plan would permit the commission to delegate authority, strengthen the power of the chairman to assign personnel, including commissioners, to duties, and restrict litigants' right of appeal to the full commission. It is designed, according to President Kennedy, to give the agency greater flexibility and improve its efficiency. 'Buck' Fever ■ But opposition to the plan sprouted almost at once. A majority of the commissioners maintained it would reduce their importance and destroy the bi-partisan nature of the commission. As Commissioner Robert T. Bartley, a Democrat and a nephew of speaker Rayburn, told the Harris subcommittee last week, "The proposed plan raises in my mind the basic question whether we are to have communi cations regulated by a bi-partisan independent commission or by an administrator ... I perceive the possibility would be created for reducing the function of the six other commissioners to almost that of scribes." In Congress, opposition developed first among members like Rep. Hoffman who are opposed in principle to any Reorganization Act legislation the White House asks Congress to accept or reject. It soon spread to those who saw in the proposed strengthening of the chairman who serves at the President's pleasure, an attempt by the White House to usurp Congress' power over the regulatory agency. This uneasiness was heightened by FCC Chairman Newton N. Minow's tough talk before the NAB convention two weeks ago (Broadcasting, May 15). Broadcasters, still feeling the sting of the speech which described their programming as a "vast wasteland," are reported to be pushing for the plan's defeat in Congress. Members NEWSPAPERS THAT MEAN BUSINESS IN SAN DIEGO San Diego County ranks 2nd in automotive sales on the West Coast, 15th in the nation.* Cover the market in San Diego's sturdiest advertising vehicles— The San Diego Union and Evening Tribune. These metropolitan dailies have prepared a special automotive sales study. Ask your West-Holliday representative for your copy, or write to General Advertising Department, Union-Tribune Publishing Co., San Diego 12, California. Copley Newspapers: 15 Hometown Daily Newspapers covering San Diego, California — Greater Los Angeles — Springfield, Illinois— and Northern Illinois. Served by the Copley Washington Bureau and The Copley News Service. Represented nationally by West-Holliday Co., Inc. (Nelson Roberts & Associates) file &an 5ie£a Inion Evening Tribune "The Ring of Truth" BROADCASTING, May 22, 1961 55