NAB reports (Jan-Dec 1943)

what I believe to be the principle involved in Sec¬ tion 16 of the bill. As I read it, it is intended to instruct the Commission not to penalize persons in a manner not authorized by statute. Perhaps I am wrong in my interpretation but I firmly be¬ lieve that no rate investigation would have been ordered against us if our stockholders had main¬ tained abject silence over the injustice that was done in Algiers. * * * * “There is a real gap in the present law. The Federal Communications Commission determines what frequencies are to be allocated to communi¬ cations companies, broadcasting stations and all other private companies and persons. The Pres¬ ident, however, has absolute say as to what fre¬ quencies go to the Government departments, in¬ cluding not only the Army and Navy but the OWI, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Commerce and others. Both the Commission and private industry are helpless if Government De¬ partments make excessive or unjust demands for frequencies and the President upholds them. Pri¬ vate industry is helpless if the Commission through its Chairman, sides with the Government Departments at secret sessions. There is no forum or machinery for presenting the just claims of private industry. The Chairman of the Com¬ mission cannot possiblv be an adequate spokes¬ man for those claims. There is no one who stands in the position of disinterested arbiter between those claims and the claims of Government. Gov¬ ernment departments are like private companies and individuals: all of them are under a tempta¬ tion to demand more than they really need, having no regard for the needs of others. “I have no specific amendment to propose to cure this gap. I simply leave it with you as a problem worthy of serious thought. The solution becomes all the more vitally necessary as the end of the war approaches. It is not solely a problem of Press Wireless or of radio-communication com¬ mon carriers. The future fate of FM broadcasting and television will be settled in the same way, that is whether these new radio services will have adequate bands of frequencies set aside for them and whether the frequencies will be those best suited for the purpose or will simply be those that the Government Department don’t want. “Press Wireless urges legislation in all parlia¬ ments and conventions between all nations, which affirm and strengthen the freedom of the press. We mean more than freedom of expression. We mean freedom of movement. In the modern world one is the corollary of the other. Such measures do not create a privileged class. They destroy ignorance and intolerance on which the i)rivileged classes prev and in which wars are born. “Public information is the life blood of repre¬ sentative government and of world peace. Every effort to protect it from official caprice, as in this bill, should be supported by all the people.’’ (in Thursday, December 2, 1943 the hearings were resumed. Present : Senators Wheeler, Chairman ; White, Tobey, Tunneil, Moore, McFarland. Mr. Len De Caux, Publicity Director of the CIO was the first witness. Unlike the A. F. of L., which the previous day came out for an unfettered radio, the CIO, through Mr. DeCaux, proposed increased governmental control of programs and program content. Chairman Wheeler at one point suggested that CIO might not want such broad powers vested in the FCC as Mr. DeCaux proposed. Labor might have a friendly FCC today, the Chairman said, but find itself confronted by an extremely un¬ friendly Commission some time in the future. Mr. DeCaux agreed that the exact degree of con¬ trol the FCC should exercise was a problem, but he insisted that Labor should have some agency to which it might carry its complaints when re¬ fused time on the air. The CIO submitted the following proposals, for legislation : “(1) That a larger proportion of free time should be made available to labor organiza¬ tions than has been the case in the past, par¬ ticularly iff the form of regularly recurring sustaining' programs. “(2) That labor organizations should suffer no blanket restriction on their right to pur¬ chase radio time. “(3) That labor organizations should suffer no blanket restrictions on their right to use the radio for the solicitations of membership or in organizing campaigns. “(4) That serious consideration should be given to the establishment of machinery for the relief of labor and other organizations in cases where there is a discriminatory denial of their right to buy or receive free time on the air.” Mr. A. Earl Cullum, Jr. Consulting Radio En¬ gineer of Dallas, Texas now with Harvard Radio Research Laboratories was the next witness. He said he was appearing to present to the Committee his personal views based on his experience as an engineer practicing before the Federal Commu¬ nications Commission. He limited his remarks primarily to Standard Broadcasting FM, televi¬ sion and various electronic developments coming out of the war. He stressed the fact that due to gains as a result of the v/ar effort there would be a tremendous increase in frequencies available for use, and a tremendous increase in the number of trained technicians available for making use of these developments. He said he thought that at the present time manufacturers needed to be planning for these developments so they could be in a position to make the models needed and so that their equip¬ ment will not be on a pre-war basis. He said that the Standard Broadcasting now in use should and will be continued but it should be reorganized so that FM particularly in metro [11]