In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants (1913)

Record Details:

Title:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants
Date:
1913
Publisher:
New York, Appeal Printing Co.
Volume:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants : record volume 1
Leaf #:
000120
Language:
English
Collection:
Government & Law and Early Cinema
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
The Museum of Modern Art Library, New York
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
These seven volumes contain the testimonies and supporting documents from the U.S. District Court's antitrust lawsuit against the Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC). Formed in 1908, the MPPC (sometimes referred to asœ"the Edison Trust" or just "the Trust") sought to control the American film industry through pooling patents and demanding that producers and exhibitors acquire licenses to those patents. Independent producers and exhibitors, who refused to license the patents, argued that the MPPC was an unlawful monopoly. In 1912 and 1913, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania heard testimonies from both MPPC members, such as Siegmund Lubin, and "Independents" who later became Hollywood moguls, such as William Fox. Ultimately, in 1915, the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which found the MPPC in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act and spelled the end for the already weakening MPPC. -- Eric Hoyt, 2012
Date Added:
May 23, 2024
Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




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.

98 Bulletins to Exhibitors. 1. To insure to the manufacturer a fair and reasonable price for his film so as to enable him to maintain and improve the quality of his pictures. No effort is to be made to prevent free and absolute competition among the licensed manufacturers, all of whom realize that ultimate success can only come when the efforts of each manufacturer are directed to the improvement of the tone and quality of his output. Unless the price shall be reasonable and the quality high, the manufacturers could not expect to obtain the friendly interest and co-operation of the exhibitor and the exchange, without which success could be neither expected nor deserved. 2. By reason of the high quality of their pictures, the licensed manufacturers expect to eliminate the cheap and inferior foreign films which have been forced upon the market, and to so educate the public taste that only high class and attractive films will be accepted as reaching the American Standard. 3. To prevent the renter from supplying scratched and worn out film by compelling him to return all such film to the manufacturer for destruction. 4. To furnish through its several licensees an adequate variety and supply of first-class subjects (at least eighteen reels per week). 5. To afford the legitimate exhibitor protection from ruinous and unfair competition by refusing to license or supply licensed film to a new exhibitor attempting to start a show where not required by public demand and where the competition would injuriously affect an existing licensed theatre. 6. To encourage in all possible ways the commendation and support of the moving picture business by the better class of the community. The aims of the Company entitle it to the cordial support of every exhibitor who is interested in the permanence and welfare of the moving picture business. The deplorable conditions existing in Europe to-day illustrate the