We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
10/7/41
FCC POWER TO BAR MULTIPLE OWNERSHIP CHALLENGED
It became very apparent at the hearing last Monday on the adoption of a proposed rule by the Federal Communications Com¬ mission prohibiting ownership of more than one broadcasting station serving the same area, that there was not so much objection to the regulation itself as there was that no proviso had been made that each case should be taken up separately and on its own merits. The Commissior^ in fact, was warned that it would overstep its authority in making such a rule. Moving along at a speed not in keeping with the temperature in Washington, which climbed into the nineties, the hearings were concluded in a single day. Whether or not the sharp comeback the stations made sealed the doom of the new regula¬ tion, could not be told definitely, but it did seem that counsel opposing it scored heavily all along the line.
"What is the reason in the mind of the Commission for the enactment of such a regulation?" John C. Kendall, of Portland, Ore., representing the Louis Wasmer stations, KHQ and KGA, argued. "What are the abuses that now exist requiring the adoption of such a rule? While the Commission up to the present time has not declared, in so many words, that prevention of monopoly is the fundamental reason, we submit that there could be no other logical basis or reason that ai,^t be assigned. "
Stating that KHQ is the Spokane outlet for the Red Network, and KGA for the Blue, that KGA is likewise the outlet for the MutualDon Lee Network and that KFPY carries CBS programs, Mr. Kendall declared that no chanrges of monopoly had ever been made against either KHQ, or KGA and that no monopoly could result as a climax of their operation. Mr. Kendall stated that the proposed rule attempting to prevent monopolistic control is an unlawful exercise of the power delegated to the Commission by Congress. He further asserted that the Act creating the Commission does not authorize or permit it to detemine what constitutes a monopoly. Mr. Kendall said the actual investment in KGA exceeds ^240,000.
Representing the Buffalo Broadcasting Corporation, Former Representative Frank D. Scott denounced the rule as unnecessary and undesirable and said that the Commission already had the power to deny applications not in the public interest so why make another regulation unnecessarily.
"I don’t think it is right for this Commission to correct the mistakes which it thinks Congress made when it drafted the Communications Act", Mr. Scott declared. "All the present multiple ownership stations in this country were made by the Commission or its predecessor. I don't know whether multiple owned stations are operating in the public interest, and I don't believe the Commission does. The Commission has these people to go ahead and invest their money and now they are going to try to rule them out of business. "
6