Mr. RAYMER. Yes. Mr. BALLINGER. What is he-a former president of what? Mr. RAYMER. The National Leather and Shoe Finders Association. Mr. BALLINGER. He is former president? Mr. RAYMER. Yes, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. Did you ever complain to him that there were widespread violations of the Robinson-Patman Act in the Omaha territory? Mr. RAYMER. Not to my knowledge. Mr. BALLINGER. And complained bitterly about it? Mr. RAYMER. Not to my knowledge. Mr. BALLINGER. You never sold the same quantity of leather on the same day to different parties at different prices; did you? Mr. RAYMER. I do not imagine that that would ever happen. Of course, we have a quantity discount on rubber and leather, also. Mr. BALLINGER. I said in the same quantity. Mr. RAYMER. It would always be sold at the same price. Mr. BALLINGER. You do not exceed the discount allowed under the Fair Trade Act? Mr. RAYMER. No. Mr. BALLINGER. In the sale of rubber heels? Mr. RAYMER. No, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. That is all. Chairman PLOESER. Is there anything you might want to volunteer for the information of the committee that might be helpful to the committee in studying this question? Mr. RAYMER. Of course, we have a schedule on rubber products, if you would care to have that. Chairman PLOESER. I would like to have it. Mr. RAYMER. I can furnish that. Mr. BALLINGER. And your schedule under the Fair Trade Act, your schedule of discounts. Mr. RAYMER. You mean on quantities? Mr. BALLINGER. Yes; on quantities. Mr. RAYMER. Yes. Chairman PLOESER. We thank you. (Witness excused.) TESTIMONY OF THOMAS S. TEDESCO (The witness was duly sworn and testified as follows:) Mr. BALLINGER. State your name. Mr. TEDESCO. Thomas S. Tedesco. Mr. BALLINGER. You have heard the questions put to Mr. Raymer? Mr. TEDESCo. Yes. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you think that in this area here there are violations of the Robinson-Patman Act by your competitors? Mr. TEDESCO. No; not that I know of. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you think there are? Mr. TEDESCO. There may be, I do not know; I have never heard of any. Mr. BALLINGER. Have you ever made any complaints to any parties outside this State that this market suffers from violations of the Robinson-Patman Act? Mr. TEDESCO. No, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you know Mr. Norman Shaffer, too? Mr. BALLINGER. You do not know Mr. Norman Shaffer? Mr. BALLINGER. You never met him? Mr. TEDESCO. No, not that I remember. I might have met him, but I do not remember. Mr. BALLINGER. Certainly you do not recall ever having made any statement to him? Mr. TEDESCo. No. Mr. BALLINGER. That there were widespread violations of the Patman Act here? Mr. TEDESCO. No, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. That is all. Chairman PLOESER. Anything you would like to volunteer to the committee on the leather business? Mr. TEDESCO. No, sir. Chairman PLOESER. We thank you. (Witness excused.) TESTIMONY OF CHARLES REED, ON BEHALF OF THE DRISCOLL LEATHER CO. (The witness was duly sworn and testified as follows:) Mr. BALLINGER. Give your name for the record. Mr. REED. Charles Reed. Mr. BALLINGER. What is your business? Mr. REED. I am a director of a business known as Driscoll Leather Co. I am not active in the business. I am an attorney. It has a capitalization of $60,000 represented mostly by a testamentary trust. I am an attorney, which is how I happened to be connected with the business. Mr. BALLINGER. Are you familiar with the operations of the business? Mr. REED. In general; yes, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. You have heard the testimony offered by Mr. Kotin and Mr. Levy. Have you any comments to make on that testimony? Mr. REED. Not any at all. Mr. BALLINGER. You do not think that there are widespread violations of the Robinson-Patman Act in this territory? Mr. REED. I have not heard of any. Mr. BALLINGER. You do not believe that competitors in the wholesale part of the leather finders industry have been giving excessive discounts to repair shops to get the business away from you? Mr. REED. That is an entirely different question, whether excessive discounts are given. That is not the Robinson-Patman Act. Mr. BALLINGER. That is the Robinson-Patman Act. Mr. REED. If it is uniform by one firm selling, if it is uniform, as I understand it, they can sell at any price they want to; but no two people are compelled to sell at the same price under the RobinsonPatman Act. Your questions are different. To answer your question, I have not heard of any complaints of any wholesaler or distributor himself varying prices on given quantities. Mr. BALLINGER. On given quantities. Do you have any complaints of the discount schedules themselves as not being justified by savings in cost? You know the discount schedules of your competitors; do you not? Mr. REED. No; I do not. I know them in general, but not specifically. Mr. BALLINGER. I mean, through your salesmen, you are acquainted with them because when you try to make a sale that is what they tell you? Mr. REED. Yes, in general. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you feel any of the discount schedules of any of your competitors are excessive in that such schedules are not justified by savings in cost? Mr. REED. Anytime they can sell cheaper than our firm can sell, why we have complaints against them in that it costs us business, but whether there are any discounts being offered in violation of the Robinson-Patman Act Mr. BALLINGER. That is not the question. Mr. REED. I am trying to get to the tail end of the question. I will try to answer the last of the question if you will restate the last of the question. Mr. BALLINGER. I wanted to find out whether you think that the discount schedules of your competitors would not be able to qualify under the Robinson-Patman Act, because if such discounts, as between one type of buyer buying one quantity and another type of buyer buying a larger quantity, are excessive in that the difference is not justified by a saving in cost. Mr. REED. I do not know of any instance. Mr. BALLINGER. You do not think there are such schedules existing in your territory? Mr. REED. Within my knowledge, no. Mr. BALLINGER. That is all. (Witness excused.) TESTIMONY OF ALVIN C. MYRICK, ON BEHALF OF ALLIED INDEPENDENT THEATRE OWNERS OF IOWA AND NEBRASKA (The witness was duly sworn and testified as follows:) Mr. BALLINGER. State your name. Mr. MYRICK. Alvin C. Myrick, Lake Park, Iowa, with the Allied Independent Theatre Owners of Iowa and Nebraska. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you own a theater locally? Mr. MYRICK. No, I have a theater in a small town of about a thousand population. Mr. BALLINGER. What is the town? Mr. MYRICK. Lake Park, Iowa, about 200 miles out. Mr. BALLINGER. Are you a member of the Allied States MotionPicture Exhibitors? Mr. MYRICK. I am. Mr. BALLINGER. Both the national organization and the regional organization? Mr. MYRICK. I am. Mr. BALLINGER. Are you an officer of the regional organization? Mr. MYRICK. Yes, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. What office do you hold? Mr. MYRICK. The region is set up as the Nebraska-Iowa unit. I am president of that unit. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you have a statement that you wish to make for the committee? Mr. MYRICK. What I want to do is to protest the action of the distributors in the face of the recent Supreme Court decision on the forcing of the sales of undesirable pictures on independent exhibitors. First, I would like to clarify what an independent exhibitor is up against, in case you are not familiar with it. The independent exhibitors in Iowa and Nebraska are by far the majority of them-probably 90 percent or more in smaller stations, stations that the affiliated exhibitors want no part of. What I want to protest is the forcing of the sales of undesirable pictures on to the exhibitors. The Supreme Court has ruled that they do not have to buy one picture in order to get another one. They have been forcing us to buy pictures that we do not want in order to get the ones we do want. Chairman PLOESER. Are they continuing that practice? Mr. MYRICK. They are continuing the practice. Mr. BALLINGER. They have dropped down, whereas they used to sell you more Mr. MYRICK. They sold us a whole year's product; then they got down to selling us in blocks of from one to five or six. I have submitted that Supreme Court decision here for the record. According to. that decision, if they come out to sell us six pictures, we have the privilege of buying one and they cannot add the price of three, four, or five pictures on to that one. Mr. BALLINGER. But they do that? Mr. MYRICK. That is what they do. Mr. BALLINGER. You have tried to buy one and you find that you are buying three or four? Mr. MYRICK. In many cases that is the case. Chairman PLOESER. Who is doing this? Mr. MYRICK. Everybody; everybody who is selling pictures. Mr. MYRICK. The Twentieth Century-Fox, Paramount, Warner Bros. Chairman PLOESER. Any others? Mr. MYRICK. It is rather confusing because some of them, until a future date, probably are not bound by the Supreme Court decision.. In this Paramount case all companies were not involved; and the Court did not instruct all of them to abide by it. However, we expected all of them to abide by it. If all of them are to abide by this,. then probably all of them are offenders. The illegal clearance that was touched on here by Mr. Huhnke is another matter of our complaints. Mr. BALLINGER. What remedy would you suggest for that illegalclearance matter? How would you set it up? Mr. MYRICK. Illegal clearance does not affect the majority of the small independent exhibitors; however, in some cases where we have suburban runs, our theory is that all theaters that charge 50 cents admission should be given the picture at the same time. If they charge 83019-49- -22 40 cents admission, they should be allowed to play the picture at the same time. The practice of the distributor is this: Their affiliated operators get the picture and take all the cream off it in the first run, even though the admission is the same as the following run. Mr. BALLINGER. You would not want two theaters charging 40 cents to run the same picture right alongside of each other, or right across the street from one another? Mr. MYRICK. Both theaters are affiliated houses, owned by the same outfit. What I have reference to is a theater down here that charges 50 cents and one out here—— Mr. BALLINGER. You mean where they are separated? Mr. MYRICK. Where they are not in substantial competition with one another. Mr. BALLINGER. How could that be done? In other words, when they sell you a picture, do they have a book in which they make a booking? Mr. MYRICK. Yes: that is right. Mr. BALLINGER. You can ask for a spot and say, "We would like to exhibit this picture on such-and-such a day." Mr. MYRICK. In the clearance situation where the admission governs it, when the date automatically comes up to play a picture in a given. theater, whatever their biggest money spot is, where they get most. of their money, if it is to be controlled by that theater, when that theater plays a given picture, every theater that is charging the same admission should play that picture at the same time. Mr. BALLINGER. To do that, you would have to have prints? Mr. MYRICK. That is right, and they can have the prints; only, they add the scarcity of prints as a means of raising the prices. Mr. BALLINGER. In other words, if you had more prints, that would be an extra cost; but that would be added to the cost of your film? Mr. MYRICK. Yes; that is right. An exchange down here would have as high as 8 or 9 prints on lots of shelves, sometimes 11. Mr. BALLINGER. You mean in the old days? Mr. MYRICK. Not so long ago; but they found out that this scarcity helps to jack up the price. Now they have cut down on the prints. They have two or three prints. Then they serve them to you on the ability to pay, and we maintain that ability to pay does not enter into it. The admission that you charge at your theater should govern. Mr. BALLINGER. That should govern the matter? Mr. MYRICK. Yes. If one of these affiliated houses has 2,000 seats, and it may be a big town, it has more ability to pay than a nice, de luxe 500-seat house has. But the big one with the ability to pay under the present set-up gets the picture and gets the profits. Mr. BALLINGER. Do you think this failure to furnish prints is part of a conspiracy to restrict the production of films in the United States? Mr. MYRICK. Yes, sir. Mr. BALLINGER. You think there is a restriction in the amount of films in Hollywood? Mr. MYRICK. Yes. Not only is there a limitation on the production of them; after they get them made, they do not release them. They hold them up, controlling the supply so the demand will raise the price. |