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)

TRADE PRACTICES IN MOTION-PICTURE INDUSTRY 7 and many other groups. A vivid illustration of this cycle is contained in the analysis of the complete story or plot outlines of 133 feature pictures made by Kev. David A. Lord, S. J., and printed in the House hearings on a companion bill, H. R. 6472, in 1936. 10 The effect of those pictures on the generation of young people who, by the millions saw them every week for several years is embodied in their lives and in the life of the nation of which they are a vital part. 2. Another bad effect has been the loss of independence and responsibility by local welfare groups. Through the activity of the public relations department of the Hays Association hundreds of local groups have been persuaded to abandon efforts to prevent the showing of objectionable pictures and to confine their efforts to advertising the best films. "Boost the best and ignore the rest" is the slogan that was coined for them; but the pictures they are taught to ignore still have to be shown. For a long time those groups were, and some of them still are, blind to the fact that they were working for a system which they cannot control. Their speeches, telephone calls, and circularizations stimulate attendance at exhibitions of the better pictures, but they are merely making the best of a bad situation, since they cannot exercise any real influence over the type of pictures produced or exhibited until the baneful block booking and blind selling trade practices are outlawed.11 3. A third unfortunate result has been the creation of a monstrous propaganda machine over which communities have no control. Col. Jason S. Joy, of Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation, speaking in opposition to the bill, said: I say to you that the moment war becomes even a possibility, so far as this country is concerned, our industry is going to be asked to change our programs, and will be asked to make a definite change almost overnight and it would not be at all possible for us, this summer, to indicate what we would have in pictures if such an emergency came about. If such course were followed, local communities would, under existing conditions have to submit to centralized control of public opinion by means of the movies. It is by the control of such means of mass communication that the European dictatorships have been able to maintain their hold on national sentiment. That this observation is not far-fetched is indicated by a story in the Washington Post for May 3, 1939 (after the hearing had closed), to the effect that Edmund Goulding, "Holly wood's most prolific idea man," was prepared to go to New York to turn his biggest idea — an American propaganda bureau — into a reality.12 10 "Twenty-six plots or episodes were built on illicit love, i. e., love outside of marriage; 13 plots or main episodes were based on seduction accomplished; 2 had episodes based on rape; 12 plots or episodes presented seduction as attempted or planned; 1 went to the extreme of building on attempted incest; 18 characters, mostly all leading characters, lived in open adultery; 7 characters were shown planning or attempting adultery; 3 presented prostitutes as leading characters (prostitutes as incidental characters were frequent); and, in addition to these 25 presented scenes and situations and dialogs and dances of indecent or antimoral character. So we find 107 major and distinct violations of sex morality and decency in a list of 133 pictures." Other illustrations are to be found in the earlier reports of this committee in 1936 and 1938 on predecessor bills. II The National Congress of Parents and Teachers and numerous other national organizations, finding that this form of cooperation with the industry was futile, adopted a policy of noncooperation with the industry until such time as legislation to abolish compulsory block booking and blind selling was enacted. 12 Excerpts: "Goulding, who first gained fame during the World War as a propagandist and who later became one of Hollywood's highest-paid directors, said he hoped to coordinate leaders of public thought into one all-powerful committee: T hope we can get a leading newspaper publisher,' he said, 'a radio chieftain, a magazine owner, a ranking churchman, a movie producer, and a book publisher, all to sit on the same committee, talk over national problems, and give their opinions to the public. If such men acted collectively, they could saturate the American mass mind in a week to a point of 75 percent conviction. They could be the most valuable.' "