ABSTRACT
The American press is anxious to persuade its public that there is the chance of entering an epoch in which quite fundamental readjustments are called for with the institutions and ideas which were suited to the civilization of the early nineteen-hundreds. There are over twenty thousand cinemas in the United States, with accommodation for some twelve million people; and it is estimated that more than one hundred million persons go every week to the films. In the United States, as elsewhere, the ultimate control of the radio is vested in the federal government; it operates through a commission the members of which are appointed by the president with the approval of the Senate. The direct entrance of the federal government into film-making, of course, raises important political questions. The growth of a centralized political power to match the growth of centralized economic power was, with a time-lag always in its operation, another vital source of the same confusion.
