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The Radio Act of 1927 (signed into law February 23, 1927) made almost no mention of the
radio networks that were in the process of dominating
radio. The only mention of radio networks was vague: The Commission {the Federal Radio Commission} shall "Have the authority to make special regulations applicable to stations engaged in chain broadcasting." Advertising was mentioned in the act with only slightly more
authority than networking; merely requiring advertisers
to identify themselves:
"All matter broadcast by any radio station for which
service, money, or any other valuable consideration is
directly paid, or promised to, or charged to, or accepted by, the station so broadcasting, from any
person, firm, company, or corporation, shall at the time
the same is so broadcast, be announced as paid for or
furnished as the case may be, by such person, firm,
company, or corporation."
The act did not authorize the Federal Radio
Commission to make any rules regulating advertising. The
content of any programming could not have "obscene, indecent, or profane language." Otherwise anything could be programmed, though the Federal Radio Commission could
take into consideration programming when renewing licenses. A forerunner of the "equal time rule" was
stated in section (18) of the Radio Act of 1927 which
ordered stations to give equal opportunities for
political candidates. The act did vest in the Federal
Radio Commission the power to revoke licences and give
fines for violations of the act.
The Radio Act of 1927 divided the country into
five zones. Each was to have one person to be on the
commission. The Davis amendment to the act required that
each zone was to have equitable allocations of licenses,
time of operation, station power, and wavelength. This
greatly complicated things for the commissioners; e.g.
the northeast had a greater population than the
southwest, thus a greater need, but it still had to have
as many stations as the southwest.
On February 25, 1928 Charles Jenkins Laboratories of Washington, DC became the first holder of a television license from the Federal Radio Commission.
The first three were confirmed by the Senate and the
first two died soon afterward. Bellows and Caldwell
didn't receive salaries, but stayed on anyway. These
three did conduct a badly needed reallocation of
frequencies. In October Bellows left the commission to
return to Minneapolis where he had been a
broadcaster. In November 1927 Harold Lafount and
Sam Pickard joined the commission. In March 1928
Caldwell was barely confirmed and Ira Robinson
became chairman, the commission was finally complete.
In the spring of 1928, the commissoners made
drastic reallocations and told 164 stations to justify
their existence or be forced to stop broadcasting.
Eighty-one stations did survive, most with reduced
power. Educational stations didn't fare very well. They
were usually required to share frequencies with
commercial stations and operate during the daytime,
which was considered worthless for adult education.
KFKB Milford, Kansas had been renewed several times by the Federal Radio Commission. It was the most popular station in the nation. KFKB was owned by a "surgeon" who, among other things, espoused, over the airwaves, goat glands as a cure for various illnesses. The American Medical Association was very upset over his prescriptions, so in 1930 the Federal Radio Commission denied his request for renewal. Dr. John Brinkley, the "surgeon", appealed on the grounds of censorship. The U.S. Court of Appeals denied his appeal. The court ruled that the Federal Radio Commission could consider past programming content without it being censorship. This, however, didn't stop the ever-popular Dr. Brinkley, who almost won the governorship of Kansas in 1928 by write-in votes. He simply beamed his programs to the United States over 100,000 watt XER Mexico. This was twice the power of any broadcast radio station save one experimental 500,000 watt station WLW Cincinnati.
WNYC, the municipal station of New York City, was assigned a part-time, low-power channel. It appealed and lost. Even though the station was government owned, the Federal Radio Commission said that city ownership did not give the station any special standing concerning the "public interest, convenience, and necessity." This was representative of the decline of public broadcasting. Both cases asserted the right of the Federal Radio Commission.
In 1934 Congress passed the Communications Act,
which remained unchanged for almost sixty years. The
Federal Communications Commission, created by the
act replaced the Federal Radio Commission.The Radio Act of 1927
Formation of the Commission
President Calvin Coolidge nominated five men to
the commission: Admiral W.H.G. Bullard as chairman,
Colonel John F. Dillon, Eugene O. Sykes, Henry A. Bellows, and Orestes H. Caldwell. Radio Licensing
Federal Communication Commission