Evening star., 1934-11-25
WIRE AND RADIO
SHIFTS UNCERTAIN
Congress Must Decide How
Much Power to Give
Commission.
BY MARTIN CODEL.

BY MARTIN CODEL.
r VOW far the New Deal will 60
- in bringing under stricter
Federal control If not actually
reshaping the great COM
munications utilities of the
Nation-the wire and wireless tele-
phones and telegraphs-has many
leaders in those industries puzzled as
they await the coming of the new
Congress with its many new faces.
One of the things the next Congress
must decide is how much more power
1t shall give the Federal Communica-
tions Commission, q creature of the
last Congress.
That body really embraces three
subcommissions as 1t organized itself
after President Roosevelt last Sum-
mer named its seven members. It's
telephone. telegraph and broadcast
divisions consist of three commission
ers each, with Chairman Eugene O.
Sykes sitting as ex-ofhcio member of
each practically autonomous division.
Judge Sykes. a holdover from the for
mer Federal Radio Commission, in
herited one of the most arduous ad-
ministrative and quasi-judicial posts
that has fallen to any servant of the
New Deal.
Indeed. under the driving force of
Judge Sykes and the three division
chairmen, the F. c. C. is today one
of the busiest of the Federal Govern
ment's agencies. 1t Is carrying on
virtually unchanged, so far as or
binary routine is concerned, the work
of the old Radio Commission. It's
jurisdiction over wireless is full and
complete; there is no question about
any division of authority with the
States, as in the case Of the telephone
field whose operations and revenues
are preponderantly in intrastate
commerce.
Review Of UNDERTAKINGS.
Some small idea of why the F. C. C.
is seeking a budget at least quadruple
the 100000 budget under which the
former Radio Commission functioned
may be derived by brief review Of
what 1t has undertaken to do, quite
aside from what the new Congress
may order it to do. One of its first
definite assignments is a detailed re-
port to Congress. to be submitted oy
February /, proposing new legislation
that will more clearly define its scope
and authority than does the COM
munications act of 1884.
In effect this means three reports
one from each division. The telephone
division, for example, regards itself
competent, under the act, to inquire
into the corporate history, financial
structure and interlocking operating
and manufacturing units of the big
A. T. & T. Co. Such an inquiry has
just been ordered. presumably to fur
niSh a basis for the regulation Of
interstate operations and interstate
telephone rates.
That the commission cannot inquire
into interstate operations without in
quiring also into intrastate rate struc-
lures and operations is manifest. Some
officials are also assuming, with good
reason, that whatever findings Uncle
Sans agency derives from its investi-
cation will contribute to more effective
State regulation in the future; in
other words, that the F. c. c. stand
ards may bring about uniformity in
valuations, etc, that holding COM
panies have thus far been able to
avoid, due to the virtual absence until
now Of Federal regulation.
The F. c. C. telephone divisions
chairman, Paul A. Walker. Is eager
to cooperate with the States, and
most of them seem eager to accept
No man knows better the problem
of State vs. Federal jurisdiction OF
utilities than Mr.. Walker, himself
the former head of the Oklahoma
Corporations Commission. Yet he
must tell Congress, when the time
comes, just how he can reconcile
the fact that about 95 per cent of
all telephone traffic is purely local
or intrastate, with the broader juris-
diction that the Federal Government
inevitably has to assume.
Jurisdiction Question.
The question Of jurisdiction is not
quite so difficult for Chairman Irwin
Stewart and his telegraph division,
for fully IS per cent Of the telegraph
business is done in interstate COM
merce. The two big wire telegraph
companies, Western Union and
Postal, have already aired their COM
petitive situations before his division
with respect to exclusive contracts
for railroads and their terminals or