Static for Public TV

For more than six months public broadcasting has been embattled by an attempt by the Nixon Administration to gain veto power over all programs. The Administration's instrument has been the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, an independent Government board that used to be little more than a conduit for the limited federal funds devoted to public TV. But after Nixon appointees gained a majority on the board last fall, the CPB suddenly took on a new purpose. It not only withheld funds for many public-affairs programs but also demanded the power to kill privately financed programs that would be transmitted on Government-financed interconnection facilities. In protest, the heads of many of the 233 local stations gathered in Washington last month to fight what seemed like an attempt at Government censorship. Several members of the CPB, including Chairman Thomas Curtis, a former Republican Congressman from Missouri, finally agreed to an elaborate compromise that would have allowed the CPB control over all Government-funded programs but would have given it only partial control over other programs.

Curtis apparently thought that the compromise would be acceptable to the President. Not so. After 48 hours of intense pressure from the White House, which continued to demand total control by the CPB, ten of the 14 members rejected the plan. Discouraged, Curtis resigned last week, leaving public TV even more embattled than before.

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