Even as far back in its history as the mid 1800’s, in the midst of a Civil War, the guardians of the country that would become the United States we’re more familiar with today, were laying down the landscape and the future guidelines for the important part education should play in the development of the country and its citizens.
The Importance of the Morrill Act
The Hartford Gunn Institute, an independent policy research unit, in a paper prepared for the Association of America’s Public Television Stations in Washington D.C., in support of an electronic ‘Land Grant,’ cited the importance of the Morrill Act of 1862 in public service broadcasting. In effect they suggest that the legislation that bears his name and the work of the US Senator Justin Morrill in establishing government funds through the allocation of public owned land, not only paved the way for the establishment of the country’s public colleges and universities, but by doing so set the moral philosophy for using the same mechanism to establish public service broadcasting.
The Importance of Public Service Broadcasting.
The Gunn Institute argues that:”like the Morrill Act of 1862, the Educational Television Facilities Act of 1962 and its successor (the) Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 have resulted in the establishment of dozens of new institutions across the country dedicated to broad public education.” In the 1960’s the rapid advances in communication and the accessibility of broadcasting had increased its already acknowledged worth as a currency of communication for education purposes.
So it was that the events of history led to the signing in the White House on November 7, 1967 of a new piece of legislation that would establish what the President himself called:"a network for knowledge," in broadcasting. Previous to that, commercial networks perhaps understandably had focused their attentions on what programming was likely to, or indeed did, gain them the greatest audiences purely in numerical terms. These networks concentrated largely on what made them and in turn their advertisers the most money.
By way of introduction to the formalities the President remarked to the members of the cabinet and the interested and invited people present at the signing, a number of observations. He mentioned:
President Johnson's Remarks on the 1967 Public Broadcasting Act.
- The $30,000 Congress authorised in 1844 for the first telegraph line between Washington and Baltimore as a source of wonder of the time
- That miracles in communication now occur daily
- Radio, television, and satellite messages travel under the ocean and in the sky in seconds.
- And he asked – how will we use these inventions?
He was setting the scene in the White House that day, and posing the question, how will mankind, and in this context specifically the people of America, use these inventions?
Setting The Scene for Future of Public Service Broadcasting in the US.
The act that the 36th President was introducing that day in November 1967 he did so he said because America had “an appetite for excellence,”and he asserted it would provide for a number of things:
- It would give “a stronger voice to educational radio and television by providing new funds for broadcast facilities.”
- It promised a “major study,” of the use of TV in schools and their potential round the world.
- And it established a new institution: the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Congress had agreed previously that public radio and television broadcasting was in the public interest, not only to “instruct,” the people but for their education and for the culture of the nation as a whole. Now it was putting public funds behind this assertion. The Act itself and the policy it contained laid down amongst other declarations that public service broadcasting:
- Should address the needs of audiences not served or not properly served by the commercial broadcasters, “particularly children and minorities.”
- Should recognise the range and diversity of programming possible both locally and nationally
- Should be available to all citizens of the United States.
Furthermore and more interestingly perhaps for the country often quoted as the world’s foremost democracy, was by law stating that the private corporation the Act of Congress instructed to be established with funds from the state, "be afforded maximum protection from extraneous interference and control.”
The Morrill Act of 1862 had provided for public education and the development and the establishment of public colleges and universities. The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 President Johnson signed has given the people the same access it could be argued to television and radio. Another piece of legislation and the same visionary sense may yet be necessary for continued public access to some as yet little-known or yet unseen or unheard technology in the future.
Dan McCurdy - Dan McCurdy is a freelance writer producer creative and lecturer. Dan is one of the UK's most experienced radio writers and producers. ...
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