Invidious Danger

When Senator Kefauver's Crime Investigating Committee went off television two weeks ago, New York City cut off its extra generators and store trade went back up to normal. "The greatest show on earth" had come to an end, but the problems raised by televising the hearings remained unsolved. Television had brought the facts of interstate crime before an audience of millions, but it undermined the only justification for a Congressional investigation.

The basic purpose of such an investigation is to provide Congressmen with facts necessary for intelligent legislation. Reluctant witnesses who refuse to testify in closed sessions are charged with contempt of Congress, a delicate legal problem. But with the advent of televised open hearings, the probers demand that a witness not only answer their questions but answer them for the instruction and titillation of every TV owner in the country. There is considerable doubt that a witness can legally be punished for refusing to make a public spectacle of himself on the televised screen. Eventually, this will be a problem for the courts, but at present it only provides a witness with additional loopholes.

Since there is no established Fair Practices Law for Congressional hearings, the implications of televising these hearings become more ominous. A number of irresponsible Congressmen have capitalized on the publicity of such investigations in the past, and the new medium of TV has provided them with even greater vote-getting opportunities. The potentialities offered by a multi-million audience would be an irresistible temptation to smear experts of the McCarthy stripe.

As it now stands, each committee decides on its own sponsor and network. If a sponsor declines to televise the work of a certain committee on the grounds of insufficient public interest, a publicity-minded Congressman might guarantee that the hearings would be sensational enough to make them commercially profitable.

A parallel problem stems from the fact that only a small portion of each committee's work could be televised. The group that decides which portion will be televised holds a dangerous power over public opinion; again the tendency would be to favor dramatic accusations over the more sober refutations.

Television thus magnifies the abuses which are already prevalent in Congressional committee investigations. The drama of watching folksy moralist Tobey struggle with "Greasy Thumb" Gusik entertains the public and attracts a large audience, but this is not the purpose of such an investigation. These hearing are held to get the facts--impartially, fairly, and with a minimum of showmanship. Until Congress can settle on a Fair Practices Code for these investigations, they should not be televised.