Variety radio directory (1940)

FEDERAL RADIO REGULATION— Continued ship in Sec. 326 of the Act, it has power to refuse to renew a broadcast license because of alleged program offenses, not merely where the programs (e.g., lotteries and obscene, indecent or profane language) are specifically forbidden by the Act, but also where, in the Commission's opinion, they fail to meet the vague test of "public interest, convenience or necessity." As an illustration of the viewpoint may be cited an address by Commissioner Walker in San Francisco on March 1, 1940. Urging that the Commission establish program standards, he declared that a station must provide worthwhile service to justify its continued existence ; that stations violating the law or public interest by "promoting lotteries, or fraudulent advertising, or vulgar programs, hardly would be expected to be in a favorable position for license renewal" ; and that, although the Commission does not have the right to censor, it has important functions to perform in the public interest and its duties should be so exercised as to encourage and eventually bring about a higher standard of broadcast programs, responsive not only to the entertainment but to the educational, religious and cultural needs of our people and of the nation at large. This philosophy has frequently been buttressed by the proverb "By their fruits shall ye know them," first cited in this connection by the reviewing court in the famous and overworked Brinkley case.* Claiming this power of indirect censorship, and having on occasion successfully exercised it, the Commission is enabled to regulate program content effectively through public and private statements of members of the Commission and notices to stations by the Law Department, with the implied threat of designating renewal applications for hearing, the accompanying harmful publicity, and the possibility of deletion of the station. Under these circumstances the number of cases actually reaching the designation-for-hearing stage is relatively unimportant. The extent of censorship really exercised must be determined in the first instance from the extent and the effect of the Commission's activities prior to this stage. It was to strip the Commission of this power that the Ditter-Bailey Bill, reviewed in Part I-C of this article, was principally designed. The past year has been one of conflicting movements in the field of program control but, on the whole, it is believed that the trend noted in last year's article is still predominant, namely, toward a reduction in the extent a/nd character of the Commission's endeavor to censor programs. The trend has been far from a simple curve downward, however, and has recently been badly complicated by influences arising out of the threat of war. Earlier, comfort was derived from the attitude of the President who, in an address by his Secretary, Stephen T. Early, delivered at the annual convention of the National Association of Broadcasters July 11, 1939, was quoted as follows : "But now in our time, there has come into being another great institution for the general diffusion of knowledge — the radio. Still in its infancy, it already rivals in importance the schools and the press. The government, as the people's agent, has had and has now a still different relation to radio from that toward the school KFKB Broadcasting Ass'n v. Federal Radio Commission, 1931, 47 F. (2d) 670. 431