TV Welds U.S. Into National Unity

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28284, 23 May 1957, Page 13

TV Welds U.S. Into National Unity

[Specially written for “The Press’ by FRANK OLIVER] (Rec. 8 p.m.) WASHINGTON, May 22. No-one can travel through America today without being made conscious of vast and far reaching changes that have been wrought in the Republic by television. The judgment of this observer is that it has done more to create a coherent political state than any other single medium of communication. It has long been a parlour pastime both here and abroad to poke fun at American television and its animated and singing commercials which, frankly, appeal to the less than average intelligence But it has another and infinitely more important side, the good results of which are increasingly demonstrated. The commercials ’ remain pathetically juvenile, but the contents of programmes have risen in seriousness and importance and nowhere more so than in the development of the televised press conference. Until the advent of television Washington for most Americans was as remote as Greenland. It was a place a long way off where that disembodied thing, the government, performed its expensive functions. It had no reality for anyone away from a small section of the Eastern seaboard. Television has changed all that. It takes the functions of government and the principal figures that do the functioning regularly into more than 20 million homes Mr Roosevelt made the Presidential press conference into something that served the same purpose as question time in the House of Commons; but television takes press conferences into every

home, and every voter can size up the President, a Cabinet member, a Senator and a political candidate as these duels of wit proceed.

Mr Average American today knows more about his government and the nature and character of those who run it than ever before. • In Lower Canifornia, in Key West, in Seattle, and in the heart of boundless prairies he is as close to it as almost any resident of Washington, D.C. He sees more of the great political conventions than even the delegates in the vast halls where these gatherings are held. A delegate needs field glasses to see obscurely what is happening at the other end of the convention hall but a television camera takes a man in Florida or Maine within two feet of what is happening. So popular have these television appearances of ' governmental figures become that every network has been forced to put on regular panel discussions with groups of anywhere from four to .20 journalists grilling important figures over problems of the day. Effect On News Panels These news panels are always interesting and often sensational and occasionally they influence both domestic and foreign policy. Adlai Stevenson credits a television appearance with generating the movement which led to his unwanted nomination in 1952. It was on the programme “Meet the Press” that Senator Walter George made the suggestion that led to the summit meeting in Geneva. The President had a’ready expressed himself as against a Big Four meeting but Senator George’s suggestion that tensions might be eased by such a meeting got such an overwhelming reaction from the television audi-

ence that the President had to change his mind. Most of these shows originate in Washington, where the networks find most of their guests—the busy people who are in the news doing things that affect the lives of much of the population. In a recent and typical show—they usually last half an hour—• the Secretary for the Army appeared and answered 52 searching questions on topics connected with defence, the missile programme, the unification of fighting services, etc. These sessions are unrehearsed and most guests are told “If you’re worried or scared, don’t come on the programme." However, in fact they cannot resist and there is an excellent reason why. During the recent troubles between the Postmaster-General and Congress the Postmaster-General was lured to the programme by the argument that “the Post Office is a public servant and if what you say is true you should want to explain it to the American people—of course if you’re wrong. Of course, the Postmaster-Gen-eral appeared. They are also told that there are no indiscreet questions—only indiscreet answers. During the Suez crisis equipment was flown to Cairo and the American nation saw Colonel Nasser answering questions from the newsmen who were flown there with the equipment It is easy to see what this sort of thing has done to a nation’ of <8 sovereign States— never a coherent political whole such as France or Britain. The aeroplane has shrunk the world to the size of a parish. In America television is rapidly shrinking a vast continental area into a political entity in which everyone is or can be familiar with the everyday functions of government