Court Opinion

ID: 9422987
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:05:25.510523+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:40.802772
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Harlan,
whom Mr. Justice Stewart joins,
dissenting in part.
Under the limited grant of certiorari in this case, the Court must assume that the advertiser can perform the experiment in question and that the demonstration is as simple to execute as it appears on television. The only question here is what techniques the advertiser may use to convey essential truth to the television viewer. If the claim is true and valid, then the technique for projecting that claim, within broad boundaries, falls purely within the advertiser’s art. The warrant to the Federal Trade Commission is to police the verity of the claim itself.
*396I do not agree that the use of “mock-ups” by the television advertiser is of itself a deceptive trade practice. Further, while there was an independent deceptive element in this commercial, I do not think this record justifies the broad remedial order issued by the Commission. I would remand the case to the Commission for further proceedings.
I.
“Mock-Ups” As Such.
The faulty prop in the Court’s reasoning is that it focuses entirely on what is taking place in the studio rather than on what the viewer is seeing on his screen. That which the viewer sees with his own eyes is not, however, what is taking place in the studio, but an electronic image. If the image he sees on the screen is an accurate reproduction of what he would see with the naked eyes were the experiment performed before him with sandpaper in his home or in the studio, there can hardly be a misrepresentation in any legally significant sense. While the Commission undoubtedly possesses broad authority to give content to the proscriptions of the Act, its discretion, as the Court recognizes, is not unbridled, and “in the last analysis the words ‘deceptive practices’ set forth a legal standard and they must get their final meaning from judicial construction” (ante, p. 385). In this case, assuming that Rapid Shave could soften sandpaper as quickly as it does sand-covered plexiglass, a viewer who wants to entertain his friends by duplicating the actual experiment could do so by buying a can of Rapid Shave and some sandpaper. If he wished to shave himself, and his beard were really as tough as sandpaper, he could perform this part of his morning ablutions with Rapid Shave in the same way as he saw the plexiglass shaved on television.
*397I do not see how such a commercial can be said to be “deceptive” in any legally acceptable use of that term. The Court attempts to distinguish the case where a “celebrity” has written a testimonial endorsing some product, but the original testimonial cannot be seen over television and a copy is shown over the air by the manufacturer. The Court states of this “hypothetical”: “In respondents’ hypothetical the objective proof of the product claim that is offered, the word of the celebrity or agency that the experiment was actually conducted, does exist; while in the case before us the objective proof offered, the viewer’s own perception of an actual experiment, does not exist.” Ante, at 390. But in both cases the viewer is told to “see for himself,” in the one case that the celebrity has endorsed the product; in the other, that the product can shave sandpaper; in neither case is the viewer actually seeing the proof; and in both cases the objective proof does exist, be it the original testimonial or the sandpaper test actually conducted by the manufacturer. In neither case, however, is there a material misrepresentation, because what the viewer sees is an accurate image of the objective proof.
Nor can I readily understand how the accurate portrayal of an experiment by means of a mock-up can be considered more deceptive than the use of mashed potatoes to convey the glamorous qualities of a particular ice cream (ante, pp. 392-393); indeed, to a potato-lover “the smile on the face of the tiger” might come more naturally than if he were actually being served ice cream.
It is commonly known that television presents certain distortions in transmission for which the broadcasting industry must compensate. Thus, a white towel will look a dingy gray over television, but a blue towel will look a sparkling white. On the Court’s analysis, an advertiser must achieve accuracy in the studio even though it results *398in an inaccurate image being projected on the home screen. This led the Court of Appeals to question whether it would be proper for an advertiser to show a product on television that somehow, because of the medium, looks better on the screen than it does in real life. 310 F. 2d 89, 94; 326 F. 2d 517, 523, n. 16.
A perhaps more commonplace example suggests itself: Would it be proper for respondent Colgate, in advertising a laundry detergent, to “demonstrate” the effectiveness of a major competitor’s detergent in washing white sheets; and then “before the viewer’s eyes,” to wash a white (not a blue) sheet with the competitor’s detergent? The studio test would accurately show the quality of the product, but the image on the screen would look as though the sheet had been washed with an ineffective detergent. All that has happened here is the converse: a demonstration has been altered in the studio to compensate for the distortions of the television medium, but in this instance in order to present an accurate picture to the television viewer.
In short, it seems to me that the proper legal test in cases of this kind concerns not what goes on in the broadcasting studio, but whether what is shown on the television screen is an accurate representation of the advertised product and of the claims made for it.
II.
The Commission’s Remedy.
The Commission ordered both respondents to cease and desist from using mock-ups in any “test, experiment or demonstration” — in the case of respondent Bates, whether or not relating to Colgate products — as a result of its finding that the use of a plexiglass mock-up in this instance constituted a separate misrepresentation. If that were the only misrepresentation found by the Com*399mission, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals. The Commission, however, found another misrepresentation, not disputed here, namely, that Rapid Shave would shave sandpaper as quickly as plexiglass, and on this record I cannot say that such finding might not support the Commission’s broad order.
In so concluding, some further observations are called for. The Court brings to the support of the Commission’s broad order the suggestion that it might be difficult for the Commission to police the reliability of simulated demonstrations, and, further, that the Commission might have cause for concern as to advertisers which have demonstrated a propensity for misrepresentation. The policing factor certainly should not permit the Commission to sweep with the broad brush it has used here, since the same risk of inaccurate reproduction inheres in all commercials, not only those involving tests or experiments. Although the Commission doubtless has wide discretion in fashioning remedies (ante, p. 395), I do not believe that an order banning use of all mock-ups can be justified merely on the score of “policing.”
There is some indication, however, that the Commission has had troubles with both respondents in the past (see 59 F. T. C. 1452, 1473 and n. 30). If the Commission should find that a pattern of misrepresentations by respondents creates a substantial risk that they will not accurately portray experiments if permitted to continue using mock-ups, the Commission’s present order might well be justified. I think the Commission should have an opportunity to make such findings, which were unnecessary under what I believe was its mistaken view of the case.
To that end, I would vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to the Commission for further proceedings in light of what has been said in this opinion.