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14 Am. U. L. Rev. 124 (1964-1965)
Community Antenna Television, the Broadcaster Establishment, and the Federal Regulator

handle is hein.journals/aulr14 and id is 144 raw text is: COMMUNITY ANTENNA TELEVISION, THE BROADCASTER ESTABLISHMENT, AND THE FEDERAL REGULATOR John P. Cole, Jr.* THE DRAMATIC impression created by the community antenna tele- vision industry in recent years is perhaps the most interesting phenom- enon to take place in mass-media communications since the advent of television broadcasting. As a dynamic, new entry into a well-established and vastly influential industry, community antenna entrepreneurs are beset with old, new, and still-to-be-solved, or even yet-to-be devised, problems, most of which have a decided legal flavor. From the point of view of the lawyer, the most interesting development in this young in- dustry's struggle to prominence is the ever increasing influence and role played by the federal government directly in the affairs of community antenna operation. In the electronics mass-media communications industry, the word competition has long been a profanity of evil proportions to the es- tablished landed gentry. Even before the Supreme Court so clearly reaffirmed the principle that the business of radio broadcasting is to be conducted in a free-enterprise competitive environment, broadcasters, government regulators, and the courts, with accomplished consistency, have worked together, sometimes unwittingly, to devise novel and often- times ingenious schemes, systems, and regulatory theories, the basic effects of which have been to thwart genuine, free competition.' The legal history of commercial broadcasting is written literally in competitive controversy-the ins or haves versus the outs and have nots. Today, as has been generally the case, the substantial majority of the hearing cases and other proceedings before the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) involve basically the single issue of whether the entrenched will be encroached upon by additional sta- tions or services in the market in question. Preservation of the status quo and don't give up without a hearing are the watchwords for any self-respecting broadcaster as well as for his Washington communications counsel. Ingeniously, and many times with great persuasiveness, the es- tablished ins are able to relate the preservation and promotion of their own economic welfare directly to the government regulator's pro- * Member of the bar of the District of Columbia and the bars of the States of Maryland and Georgia. 1. Federal Communications Commission v. Sanders Bros. Radio Station, 309 U.S. 470 (1940).

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