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 (1912-1913)

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:
1912-1913
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 7
Leaf #:
00093
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:
June 27, 2024
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Edison Manufacturing Co. and Pathe Peeres. such positive motion picture, and that the purchaser shall not make any reproduction commonly known as a "dupe" of such positive motion picture or of any other posit ive motion picture licensed under reissued Letters Patent No. 1.2,192, or rent out the same or any other positive motion picture licensed under reissued Letters Patent No. 12,192, for use in giving moving picture exhibitions at a lower rental price directly or indirectly than that prescribed by the Licensor or the Licensee, as the case may be, at the time of the sale of such motion picture.; and that the purchaser of such positive motion picture shall not remove the trade mark or trade name or title therefrom, and that the purchaser shall return to the Licensor or Licensee as the ease may be from whom such positive motion pictures have been purchased i without any payment therefor except the transportation charges incident to the return of the same) on the first day of every month, beginning with August first, 1908, an amount of positive motion pictures in running feet (not purchased over six months before i and of the make of the Licensor or Licensee, as the case may be, to whom it is returned, equal to the amount that was so purchased during the sixth month preceding the date of each such return; with the exception, however, that where any such positive motion pictures are destroyed by tire or lost in transportation, and proof satisfactory to the Licensor or Licensee as the case may be is furnished as to such destruction or loss, the amount so destroyed or lost shall be deducted from the amount to be returned, as aforesaid. It is further mutually covenanted and agreed by and between the Licensor and Licensee that the rental price aforesaid for renting out of licensed positive motion pictures shall be fixed as soon after •the date of the execution of this agreement as is practicable, (and which may be changed in the same manner during the continuance of this agreement, as may also any or all of the terms and conditions recited in this paragraph), by a plurality vote of the Licensor and Licensee and the several additional licensees hereinafter provided for, or such of them as may at the time be licensees, on the basis of one vote for each thousand running feet of new subjects placed on sale in the "territory aforesaid" by each licensee and the Licensor during the year preceding the taking of such vote. (18) The Licensor and Licensee further mutually covenant and agree thai in the "sales territory aforesaid" they will dispose of the positive motion pictures manufactured, printed, produced or