To prohibit and to prevent the trade practices known as "compulsory block-booking" and "blind selling" of motion-picture films in interstate and foreign commerce (1939)

4 TRADE PRACTICES IN MOTION-PICTURE INDUSTRY This group realizes that the bill is not a "cure all" — 6 Nevertheless the national board, having, through its public affairs committee, given careful consideration to the subject and having studied the testimonv presented at hearings, expresses to you its judgment that the present barriers to the free choice of films should be removed by legislative act. Interest in this measure is widespread throughout our national constituency, in cities, towns, and rural communities. The Catholic Daughters of America are eager for the exhibitors to be made free agents so that they can conform to community standards in the selection of films, and speak to the point as follows: Since, in addition to our adult membership, the Catholic Daughters of America include 25,000 junior members, it is a matter of acute concern to our organization to guard our youth against the promiscuous display of pictures of questionable educational, patriotic, or moral value. Therefore, this bill has been circulated throughout our entire membership, has been studied and universally approved, and its endorsement duly authorized. The National Grange stresses the benefits to rural communities which would flow from the enactment of the bill in the following language: In our opinion, this practice is far more destructive of the American principle of freedom of choice in the field of entertainment in rural communities than in our cities and towns. In our urban centers there is usually more than one theater, so that if the seeker for relaxation or entertainment is unable to find that for which he is looking in one theater, he may at least have a second or a third choice. In villages or small towns where rural folk seek entertainment, there is usually not more than one motion-picture theater, and that is operated by an independent exhibitor. Dr. Guy Emery Shipley, editor of The Churchman, the oldest church publication in the United States, says: Having carried on for the past 10 years a campaign for abolishing block booking and blind selling, The Churchman has had its hand pretty well on the pulse of the religious groups of the country in respect to this problem. I can say without qualification that the great majority of church people in America are behind the Neely bill * * * I would add that all leading religious journals of the United States and the Associated Church Press, of which I am secretary, which represents the Protestant religious journals of the country, are strong for the Neely bill. THE EXTENT AND POWER OF THE MOVIES It is estimated that the weekly movie audience consists of 88,000,000 persons. Of these approximately 32,000,000 are minors and 14 percent or 12,500,000 are 13 years of age or under. The profound effects of motion pictures particularly on youth are recognized by both proponents and opponents of the bill and by those both within and without the industry. In one of the Payne Fund studies, made at the request of the Motion Picture Research Council,7 Movies, Delinquency and Crime, page 202, the authors, Messrs. Blumer and Hauser, say: Motion pictures play an especially important part in the lives of children reared in socially disorganized areas. The influence of motion pictures seems to 6 The bill is a compromise. Some of the public groups demanding remedial legislation favored strict Government regulation, including censorship at the studios. Others favored a bill requiring the leasing of pictures one at a time after they had been completed and had been given a trade showing. This compromise was effected in order to accompish needed reforms with a minimum interference with the industry's practices. 7 This is a voluntary organization of public-spirited citi7ens which has no connection with the motionpicture industry. Spokesmen for the producer-distributors sought to discredit the Payne Fund studies but all that was actually adduced was a small volume by Raymond Moley which showed on its face that it was compiled "at the suggestion of the motion-picture industry," which quoted a book by J. Mortimer Adler also written at the request of the industry.