United States v. National Football League

• Decision Date: 20 July 1961
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 12808.
• Citation: 196 F. Supp. 445
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

196 F. Supp. 445

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE et al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 12808.

United States District Court E. D. Pennsylvania.

July 20, 1961.

Walter E. Alessandroni, U. S. Atty., Donald G. Balthis, Acting Chief, Middle Atlantic Office, Antitrust Division, Philadelphia, Pa., for plaintiff.

Francis W. Sullivan, Strong, Sullivan, Saylor & Ferguson, Thomas Hart, Cornelius C. O'Brien, Jr., Alfred W. Putnam, Harry Shapiro, Hirsh W. Stalberg, Philadelphia, Pa., for defendants.

GRIM, District Judge.

Defendants have filed a petition¹ seeking a construction of the final judgment entered in this case on December 28, 1953, to the effect that a contract dated April 24, 1961, between the National Football League and the Columbia Broadcasting System does not violate the final judgment. The government contends that the contract does violate the judgment. The 1961 contract grants to CBS for a period of two years the sole and exclusive right to televise all League games, with certain limited exceptions.² After certain deductions the League will distribute equally among the fourteen teams which now comprise the League the $4,650,000 annual license fee to be paid under the contract. The government opposes the petition and by a cross-petition seeks restoration of the situation as it existed prior to the execution of the contract, (called, in the cross-petition, restoration of the status quo ante).

The government originally commenced this action by filing a complaint on October 9, 1951, charging that the defendant clubs of the National Football League, and the League itself, combined and conspired to violate the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, 15 U.S.C.A. § 1 et seq. After trial, the court filed an opinion dated November 12, 1953, D.C., 116 F.Supp. 319, finding that certain League by-laws did and certain by-laws did not violate the Sherman Act. A judgment was entered accordingly. It is this judgment that defendants seek to have construed.

Defendants concede that the 1961 NFL-CBS contract marks a basic change in National Football League television policy. Prior to this contract each member club individually negotiated and sold the television rights to its games to sponsors or telecasters with whom it could make satisfactory contracts. The NFL-CBS contract sharply departs from this practice. It is implicit in the 1961 contract that the member clubs have agreed among themselves and with the League that each club will not sell its television rights separate and apart from those of the other clubs, but that each club will pool its television rights with those of all of the other clubs, and that only the resulting package of pooled television rights will be sold to a purchaser. The clubs authorized the Commissioner of the League to sell this package of pooled television rights, and under the provisions of the 1961 contract with CBS he sold it. Thus, by agreement, the member clubs...