【正文】 revenues of the television industry were over 1,268,000,000 dollars. Profit before taxes was 243,900,000 dollars, an average return on revenue of per cent. Compare these with 1959, when gross broadcast revenues were 1,163,900,000 dollars, and profit before taxes was 222,300,000, an average return on revenue of per cent. So the percentage increase of total revenues from 39。60 was 9 per cent, and the percentage increase of profit was per cent. This, despite a recession throughout the country. For your investors, the price has indeed been right. So I have confidence in your health, but not in your product. It is with this and much more in mind that I e before you today. One editorialist in the trade press wrote that the FCC of the New Frontier is going to be one of the toughest FCC39。t surprise me if some of you had expected me to e here today and say to you in effect, Clean up your own house or the government will do it for you. Well, in a limited sense, you would be right because I39。 to strengthen it, not weaken it。 to encourage it, not threaten it。 the urge to build the character, citizenship, and intellectual stature of people, as well as to expand the gross national product. ...By no means do I imply that broadcasters disregard the public interest. ...But a much better job can be done, and should be done. I could not agree more with Governor Collins. And I would add that in today39。s world employed the atom to destroy the world or rebuild it for mankind39。s broadcasters employed their powerful voice to enrich the people or to debase them. If I seem today to address myself chiefly to the problems of television, I don39。ve gone to sleep at your switch. We haven39。m talking about this past season. Some were wonderfully entertaining, such as The Fabulous Fifties, The Fred Astaire Show, and The Bing Crosby Special。s Victory and Twilight Zone。s Future, CBS Reports, The Valiant Years. I could list many more programs that I am sure everyone here felt enriched his own life and that of his family. When television is good, nothing not the theater, not the magazines or newspapers nothing is better. But when television is bad, nothing is worse. I invite each of you to sit down in front of your television set when your station goes on the air and stay there, for a day, without a book, without a magazine, without a newspaper, without a profit and loss sheet or a rating book to distract you. Keep your eyes glued to that set until the station signs off. I can assure you that what you will observe is a vast wasteland. You will see a procession of game shows, formula edies about totally unbelievable families, blood and thunder, mayhem, violence, sadism, murder, western bad men, western good men, private eyes, gangsters, more violence, and cartoons. And endlessly mercials many screaming, cajoling, and offending. And most of all, boredom. True, you39。t do better? Well a glance at next season39。t do better? Well, is there at least one work president who believes that the other works can do better? Gentlemen, your trust accounting with your beneficiaries is long overdue. Never have so few owed so much to so many. Why is so much of television so bad? I39。 petition for ever higher ratings。 the high cost of television programs。t tell us what the public might watch if they were offered halfadozen additional choices. A rating, at best, is an indication of how many people saw what you gave them. Unfortunately, it does not reveal the depth of the peration, or the intensity of reaction, and it never reveals what the acceptance would have been if what you gave them had been better if all the forces of art and creativity and daring and imagination had been unleashed. I believe in the people39。s taste is as low as some of you assume. My concern with the rating services is not with their accuracy. Perhaps they are accurate. I really don39。s not been their accuracy it39。s news show explaining something to them about the world at their level of understanding? Is there no room for reading the great literature of the past, for teaching them the great traditions of freedom? There are some fine children39。 the editorials are not replaced by more ics。 they do not use public property. But in television, where your responsibilities as public trustees are so plain, the moment that the ratings indicate that westerns are popular there are new imitations of westerns on the air faster than the old coaxial cable could take us from Hollywood to New York. Broadcasting cannot continue to live by the numbers. Ratings ought to be the slave of the broadcaster, not his master. And you and I both know You and I both know that the rating services themselves would agree. Let me make clear that what I am talking about is balance. I believe that the public interest is made up of many interests. There are many people in this great country and you must serve all of us. You will get no argument from me if you say that, given a choice between a western and a symphony, more people will watch the western. I like westerns too, but a steady diet for the whole country is obviously not in the public interest. We all know that people would more often prefer to be entertained than stimulated or informed. But your obligations are not satisfied if you look only to popularity as a test of what to broadcast. You are not only in show business。 we want you to editorialize, take positions. We only ask that you do it in a fair and a responsible manner. Those stations that have editorialized have demonstrated to you that the FCC will always encourage a fair and responsible clash of opinion. You must provide a wider range of choices, more diversity, more alternatives. It is not enough to cater to the nation39。 you must also serve the nation39。clock Sunday morning. For every hour t