Motion Picture Daily (Jan-Mar 1934)

8 MOTION PICTURE DAILY Wednesday, February 7, 193 Vitaphone vs. Erpi Goes to Arbitration {Continued from page 1) York prior to Vitaphone's withdrawal, had cost Erpi $450,740 and Vitaphone about $300,000 which they had admitted. Arbitrators were being paid at the rate of $1,000 a day during the proceedings, plus expenses. Refers to "Unclean Hands" The court went into an extensive quotation of cases in which parties to contracts have come into court with "unclean hands," saying at one point : "This rule and the doctrine of 'unclean hands' upon which it is based, would not apply, however, if a contract to arbitrate was not repudiated arbitrarily and unreasonably and, therefore, without good and sufficient cause. "By reason of that fact, the complainant attempts to justify its failure to abide by its contract to arbitrate its pending disputes in this case, and its appeal to the court below for relief, by the contention that the arbitration proceedings have broken down and have absolutely failed to accomplish their purpose." The opinion recited that Samuel Untermyer, the first arbitrator, resigned April 11, 1930, after 32 sessions of the board had been held. Frank J. Hogan, a Washington, D. C, attorney, succeeded him and served at 30 hearings during which 4,079 pages of typewritten testimony were taken. The opinion says there were delax? in concluding arbitration proceedings, but "they are always inevitable" in proceedings of that nature. "As a matter of fact, as far as the records show, it seemed delays were almost entirely caused by arbitrators selected by the complainant," the opinion said. Held Governed by N. Y. Laws In conclusion the court said : "As we have already seen, the arbitration contracts of May 18, 1927, were made in the State of New York and were to be performed in that state. They also contained clauses providing that they should be construed according to the laws of the State of* New York; and by statute such contracts were irrevocable and enforceable in that state. These contracts were also repeatedly ratified in the State of New York by subsequent contracts to which the complainant was a party relying on these contracts. "The respondent collected and presented a great mass of testimony before the arbitrators named in defense of the claims made by the complainant against it. In the preparation of the trial of its case it also incurred tremendous expenses in the way of attorneys' fees and otherwise which, it alleged in its plea, will be of no benefit whatever to it if the authority of the arbitrators to decide the case submitted to them is revoked." Judges Layton, Harrington, Richards and Reinhardt presided. G. F. Hurd of New York and Christopher L. Ward of Wilmington represented Erpi. George Wharton Pepper of Philadelphia and Hugh M. Morris of Wilmington appeared for Vitaphone. Authority Members To Hire Attorneys {Continued from page 1) conversation with Rosenblatt at Washington. Individual members of the Code Authority will be expected to retain their own counsel. A decision on making a Code Authority appropriation to cover the cost of defending the individual members will be made at Friday's meeting of the Authority. Indications are that the expense of Flinn's defense will be borne by the Code Authority, whereas individual members may elect to retain and pay for their own counsel. One or two attorneys may be selected to represent all members, it is believed. Farnsworth Out of Theatre Authority {Continued from page 1) they helped devise are established and functioning, came today with the resignation of Deputy Administrator William P. Farnsworth as a member of the legitimate theatre Code Authority and the appointment of Robert K. Straus, son of the ambassador to France, as his successor. Farnsworth is expected to continue as a member of the radio Code Authority until it is well under way and then to step out in favor of someone less closely connected with the code. Division Administrator Rosenblatt also is expected to be removed from the film Code Authority, but probably not until the machinery is running smoothly and present difficulties have been ironed out. Sales Heads Again Talk Code Problems The second of a scheduled series of meetings of major company sales executives and circuit representatives on interpretation of trade practice provisions of the code was held yesterday at the M. P. P. D. A. offices. Object of the meetings, more of which will be held from time to time, is to equip major company distribution chiefs with a set of standard instructions on their obligations under the code. Ifs Don Thornburg Don Thornburg of the Strand and Family at Marshalltown, Iowa, has a beef. He was nominated by Allied of Iowa for a post on the clearance and zoning or grievance board for his territory as Don Thornley and also says he has been mentioned as not having signed the code. "I was one of the very first to sign and sent it registered mail, return receipt and have the returned receipt dated as received Jan. 13," he declared in a letter to Motion Picture Daily. Cleveland Hears It Cleveland, Feb. 6. — Persistently reported as having been selected for posts on Cleveland's clearance and zoning or grievance board are these men : i Nat Lefton, Monogram ; Martin G. Smith, Toledo exhibitor; Dan Robins, Warners, and Frank Drew, M-G-M. Stage Talent Wage Slashes To Be Fought {Continued from page 1) Loew's ; George Skouras ; Jack Partington, F. & M. ; Henry Chesterfield, N. V. A.; Walter Whitehead, Actors' Betterment Ass'n. ; C. B. Maddock and Marty Forkins, vaudeville producers. Eddie Cantor, Administration representative on the Code Authority, and Mrs. Dorothy Bryant, secretary of Chorus Equity, gave advance notice yesterday that they would oppose any move by the sub-committee of Code Authority to decrease minimum wages or increase maximum hours of stage talent from the present code standards. Cantor was reported prepared to resign his Code Authority post if adverse changes resulted; while Mrs. Bryant served notice that she would argue before Division Administrator Sol A. Rosenblatt that the codejias not been in effect long enough to warrant changes in labor and hour provisions for stage talent. John C. Flinn, executive secretary of the Code Authority, said yesterday that it had no formal notification of the protests of either Cantor or Mrs. Bryant, nor had it any advance intimation of what action the sub-committee would take. He said that no report of the committee's action at last night's meeting was expected by the Code Authority before Friday's meeting. Robinson Balks An Attack on the NRA {Continued from page 1) the glare of publicity upon the N.R.A. Nye's resolution, which he declared he would press at the earliest opportunity, calls for a report showing the names, position and compensation of all Recovery Administration employes other than clerks and stenographers ; their present and past business connections ; codes with which they have been connected ; positions held by all officials who have left the Administration and Code Authority connections of such persons ; names of all members of all Code Authorities and their business connections and a separate list of the codes handled by each administrator, deputy administrator and assistant deputy administrator. Final Code Board Report Tomorrow The Code Authority committee appointed to pass on nominations for local grievance boards will meet tomorrow to prepare its final report to be submitted to the Code Authority at the Friday meeting of that body. Also meeting tomorrow to complete a report for the Friday meeting of the Code Authority is the committee charged with preparation of a manual on procedure for grievance boards. Oliver for Rivoli Job Hal Oliver, formerly with RKO, is set to join the Rivoli as publieity representative, succeeding James H. MacFarland. Jones Stirs Speculation Over Credit {Continued from page 1) audience to put fear behind it and ge behind the President's recovery pro gram. "If we continue waiting on the side lines for complete recovery and as sured values, readily marketable, na turally there can be no recovery," h said pointedly. Jones said he would be the last mai in the world to advise "loose credits.' but he said he was of the opinion tha "too little credit and too severe term at this time would be worse than toi much credit." Later in his talk Jones sharply hil at the impression that there had beei too much government supervision oj banking and expressed the opinion tha' recent events had demonstrated ther has not been enough. . As one reason for easier credit terms the speaker pointed out that inl surance of deposits now makes thil more desirable. Congressional demands for fre credit may force through a law au thorizing the RFC to make direq loans, Jones warned. Continuing, he said: "I wonder i] the trouble is not in part that we arj still suffering from shell shock — stil afraid. Of what, I am unable t< divine. If property, and that take in every scope of investment, has n« value upon which to lend, then oul money can have no value. But thiJ is not open to question. Our prop! erty has value and our money ha value. It will always be so in Amer ica. Furthermore, the depression i over and we are assuredly on the up grade." The address was received with mill applause. Two Radio Stations In Deal with MPT OA {Continued from page 1) yesterday on his arrival in New York Complaints against other station are being brought directly to the at tention of their operators, and if n< relief is granted they will be filed witl the Code Authorities of both the filn and radio industries, Kuykendall said He plans to remain in New York un til after the film Code Authority! meeting Friday. Moss to Study Theatres Paul Moss, new license commissioner for New York, yesterday stated hf* has not yet had time to look into th< picture theatre situation on violation; and that he expected to shortly. H< said he had no illusions about th< theatre and while he was for clear plays did not intend to make himseli a censor for New York. He addec that he intended looking into the fak< booking agent racket as a result o many complaints to his office. Warners Drop One Warners have dropped the RexEast Rutherford, N. J., recently taker over from Al Gottesman. Samuel Kanter is reported to have acquired it