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12/17/43
SENATE RADIO HEARINGS END; NEWSPAPER OWNERSHIP NEXT
The open hearings on the Wheeler-White Bill to revamp the old Radio Act and maybe the Federal Communications Commission were concluded last Thursday (December 16). It is possible that the Senate Interstate Commerce Committee considering the measure may hold executive sessions before Christmas but with holiday adjourn¬ ment so near at hand the whole thing will probably go over into the New Year and the Committee report much later.
Showing the interest of the Senators in the subject and unquestionably a matter which the Senate and House hearings stirred up was Senator McFarland of New Mexico, inquiring when the FCC expected to reach a decision regarding the newspaper-owned broad¬ casting stations. The reply was that maybe the Commission might reoort on that before Christmas or at any rate at a very early date.
At the final session of the Senate Committee, Chairman FLy read a 29-page memo of detailed comment and recommendations on the provisions of the WheelerWhite bill. One of these with regard to forfeiture of a station license read:
"In any case where the Commission pursuant to subsection (a) hereof is authorized to revoke a license, the Commission may in lieu of revocation after notice and hearing as prescribed by Section 312(a), order the licensee to forfeit to the United States the sum of $500 for each and every day during which the Commission finds that each and every offense set forth in the notice of hear¬ ing occurs, or such lesser sum as the Commission may find appropri¬ ate in light of all the facts and circumstances of the particular case, "
Up to this time all the Commission could do was to cancel a license and there was no penalty for further broadcasts,
Anotner suggested amendment read:
"The station license, the frequencies authorized to be used by the licensee, and the rights therein granted shall not be transferred, assigned, or in any manner either voluntarily or in¬ voluntarily disposed of, or indirectly by transfer of control of any corporation holding such license, to any person, nor may stock or other participation in the ownership of any corporation holding a license, whether or not such transfer constitutes a transfer of con¬ trol, be transferred to any person, if as a result of the transfer the transferee will hold 20 percent or more of the stock or other participation in ownership, "
The House Committee lawyers questioned what they called the "relationship existing” between Mr. T="ly and Harold A. Lafount, former Commission member, who is now a radio firm executive,
Eugene Garey , Committee counsel, offered '^CC files as evidence that the Commission learned in 1941 it had not been
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