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Arbitration ^^<^><^><^>^>^>^><^> 267
City. The organization of these boards was much as it is today. They are not incorporated, they are local in character, and they are governed only by such rules as they themselves adopt. Membership in them is composed largely of the managers of the local exchanges of the various national distributors. Representatives of local distributors are asked to join and in many cases do join. These Film Boards of Trade 8 were organized for the purpose of representing the distributors in all matters of common interest in their respective local communities. Their functions by no means have been confined to arbitration. Until late in 1930, one of the duties of each board was to appoint what was known as a Credit Committee whose function it was to report to the Film Board upon the credit standing of the new proprietor of any theater whose ownership had changed hands.9 At the time these local boards were organized, there was also created in New York a head office of the Film Boards of Trade for the purpose of supervising the operations of all the boards; it arranges with the home offices of the national distributors represented in the membership for the payment of the cost of their operations; 10 it extends such advisory assistance, particularly as to legal matters, as may be requested; and it recommends the appointment of a secretary
8 The Film Board history is said to date back to 1912, when a board was formed in Denver.
9 The legality of the Credit Committees was attacked by the Department of Justice as being a means of a conspiracy in restraint of trade. The case was heard in the United States District Court of the Southern District of New York, which handed down an opinion declaring the Credit Committees and their rules to be legal under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. The United States Supreme Court reversed this decision, November 24, 1930, declaring the credit system illegal. Following this decision the Credit Committees were abandoned.
10 At the beginning of each year each Film Board of Trade sends into the head office an estimate of expenses for that year. To the total of these local expenses is added the cost of operating the central office. The final figure is then apportioned among the producer-distributor members. Dues to be paid by the local distributors' companies are arranged in conference with them. These dues, however, are never very large. The dues of a company represented on every Film Board of Trade in the United States might, for example, be $35,000 while those for a local distributor might not be in excess of $50.