Motion Picture Commission : hearings before the Committee on Education, House of Representatives, Sixty-third Congress, second session, on bills to establish a Federal Motion Picture Commission (1978)

MOTION PICTURE COMMISSION. 37 The CnATR:MAN. That is. the State or kK'al jurisdiction? Mr. Chase. Yes. For instance, they say in New York City that we ouoht to aUow the i)olicemen to come forward. Now, as a curious illustration of how that works, the man who wrote the *•' The inside of the white-sLaA'e traffic,'' which recently a jury in New York City pro- nounced to be bad and immoral—the author of that play said that he did not think the police, the judoes. and the jury were the best quali- fied people to pass on the purpose and the intent of that picture; that he would much prefer to have a trained body of people, like a board of censors, that had been studyino- that particular thing for a long time, pass upon it. It was his idea to liave it passed upon by ex- perts, trained men Avho had given thought to it, rather than to have it passed upon by some one who had not given particular considera- tion to that particular matter. Now, w^e are coming to a time, you know, when we have children's courts. Why? Because we think a judge who is dealing with children all the time is better than a man who is dealing w^ith a half dozen things and has a children's case come to him occasionally. So we are having domestic-relations courts, because we think that a man who has made a study of the family conditions is better able to deal with quarreling husbands and wives than one who is dealing with commercial and criminal matters and matters of another sort. Then also we are having pure-food laws, whereby we are inspecting, and the whole licensing system is of such a nature now tl-at it effec- tively accomplishes what we would like to have. The quickest way of seeing that the TJnited States laAvs against immoral pictures shall be enforced is by compelling every ])icture to be brought before one board and have that bc^ard pass on it. It is very much better than to allow pictures to go broadcast and then have policemen and courts follow up and find the bad pictures and then prove before the courts that tliey are bad. I think you will find this the cheapest way for the Government to secure the enforcement of this law and that it is the most effective way you will find. Instead of its injuring the motion- picture business it will be of great benefit to it. A motion-picture ex- hibitor said 1o me. "I was showing a fcAv nights ago pictures of the building of a railroad bridge and of a railroad, and I saw a boy afterwards. I said, ' Sonny, what did you think of the pictures to- night ?' He said. 'Fine. Do you know that I would rather see how to build a bridge than how to rob a bank?'"" The trouble in the past has been that our motion-picture manufacturers have not (juite realized that how to build a bridge is very interesting and that the children generally prefer .something of that kind rather than some- thing that depicts crime in such detail as excites children to crime. I thank you very much for your patient hearing. Mr. DouGHTON. I Avould like to ask, in connection with the number of commissioners whether it is your judgment that five would be any better than three? Mr. Chash. My own idea would l)e to have tliree men who would be of the highest class; men who would not do the actual inspection work to any great extent: men who would have general oversight of the work and constitute a sort of court of appeals; to have the gen- eral inspection \vork done by assistants, and have them so trained as to do the Avork in a way satisfactory to them. Then if they found