Court Opinion

ID: 9446291
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:51:29.480822+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:36.193586
License: Public Domain

MADDEN, Judge
(dissenting).
I cannot agree with the decision of the Court. I think it represents an act of generosity with regard to the time and energy of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which is completely unjustified. I think that there is not even a possibility that the further proceedings which this decision imposes upon the FCC will result in anything useful.
The basis for standing for Philco, which the Court holds to be adequate, is the fact that it is a manufacturer of electrical equipment, and that RCA, NBC’s sole stockholder, is a manufacturer of the same kind of equipment and therefore a competitor of Philco, and that NBC is using the licenses here in question to the economic injury of Philco as a competitor of RCA.
If Philco has standing, on the basis assigned by the Court, every one of the numerous other manufacturers of electrical equipment has standing. And Philco and all of the others will have standing in every case in which NBC applies for a renewal of its license for any of its several stations.
The basis for standing approved by the Court for Philco is the naked fact that it, like NBC’s sole stockholder, RCA, manufactures electrical equipment, and that NBC places the name of RCA prominently before the public in the several ways recited in the Court’s opinion. The reiteration of the name of RCA, thus making it familiar to the listening public, even though the products manufactured by RCA were not mentioned, must have advertising value, or the precious seconds réquired would not be so used.
*660The Court says that the question of economic injury giving standing “has not before arisen in the present context.” That is true. The context, as I see it, is that of competitors in a field which has no relation to the business which is the subject of the public regulation in question. The FCC has nothing to do with the manufacture of electric toasters and washing machines and nothing here relevant to do with the manufacture of television and radio sets. NBC advertises RCA. If RCA pays NBC, it is just transferring money from one pocket to another, since it owns NBC. If it does not pay NBC, it as owner of NBC, loses the revenue which it would receive if it sold the seconds in question to another advertiser, Philco, e. g.
Philco does not allege that it cannot buy time on NBC’s Philadelphia station, or NBC’s network, at the same price as any other advertiser. If it cannot afford to pay the price, or thinks the service is not worth the price, it is in the same position that all of us are in when we make our choices as to how to spend our funds.
In none of the cases cited by the Court was the alleged economic injury unrelated to the subject which was regulated by the public tribunal. In Federal Communications Commission v. Sanders Radio Station, 1940, 309 U.S. 470, 642, 60 S.Ct. 693, 84 L.Ed. 869, it was one radio station against another. In Reade v. Ewing, 2 Cir., 1953, 205 F.2d 630, it was a consumer complaining of a producer of synthetic vitamins. In National Coal Ass’n v. Federal Power Commission, 89 U.S.App.D.C. 135, 191 F.2d 462, it was coal against gas, and the legislative history of the statute showed that Congress expected the Federal Power Commission to consider the effect upon the interests of the producers of competing fuels of the licensing of extensions of natural gas pipe lines. In City of Pittsburgh v. Federal Power Commission, 99 U.S.App.D.C. 113, 237 F.2d 741, it was gas against oil in a context similar to that in National Coal Ass’n, supra. In Associated Industries v. Ickes, 2 Cir., 1943, 134 F.2d 694 it was consumers of coal against the authority having the power to fix the price of coal. In National Broadcasting Company v. Federal Communications Commission, 76 U.S.App.D.C. 238, 132 F.2d 545, affirmed 319 U.S. 239, 63 S.Ct. 1035, 87 L.Ed. 1374, it was radio station against radio station.
The problem is really the broad one of whether a radio or television network should be permitted to be owned by the owner of any other business, whether that be the electrical appliance business, the air transportation business, the newspaper business, or any other. So long as such ownership is permitted, it would seem absurd to conclude that the owner could not advertise over his own facilities, though his competitors could do so. The solution of this broad problem of station or network ownership is not tó be found in revoking, or refusing to renew the license of NBC’s Philadelphia station. It must be accomplished by generally applicable legislation, or by regulation, if the Commission has the power to issue such a regulation. It should be done after due hearing properly announced, at which hearing the numerous persons and organizations interested would have the opportunity to present their views.
The “option time” and “must buy” practices of NBC, as to which the Court finds it unnecessary to decide, seem to me to present no serious problem with regard to standing. These do not even relate to Philco as a manufacturer of electrical equipment in competition with NBC’s owner as such a manufacturer. If Philco has standing because of these practices so does every enterprise which wants to advertise on television, and finds it expensive to do so, whether the enterprise sells cigarettes, soap, airplane tickets or rides on a bus. The court might, I think, have safely fenced out this infinite number of enterprises which might claim standing.
I am not willing to accompany the Court into the new field which it now enters, and must therefore respectfully dissent.