§11 — Title 47 Telegraphs, Telephones, and Radiotelegraphs | U.S. Code

Summary

If a railroad or telegraph company refuses or fails to keep and run a telegraph line for the government or the public, including for business uses, or refuses to exchange business with a connecting telegraph company, any person or company can ask the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for help. The FCC must investigate under its rules, decide what fix is needed, and order the company to make the proper arrangements. The company must follow that order. The FCC must tell the parties and can go to a U.S. court to force compliance. The FCC can also start these investigations on its own, as if someone had complained.

Title 47, §11

Telegraphs, Telephones, and Radiotelegraphs — Source: USLM XML via OLRC

If any railroad or telegraph company referred to in section 9 of this title, or company operating such railroad or telegraph line shall refuse or fail, in whole or in part, to maintain, and operate a telegraph line as provided herein, for the use of the Government or the public, for commercial and other purposes, without discrimination, or shall refuse or fail to make or continue such arrangements for the interchange of business with any connecting telegraph company, then any person, company, corporation, or connecting telegraph company may apply for relief to the Federal Communications Commission, whose duty it shall thereupon be, under such rules and regulations as said commission may prescribe, to ascertain the facts, and determine and order what arrangement is proper to be made in the particular case, and the railroad or telegraph company concerned shall abide by and perform such order; and it shall be the duty of the Federal Communications Commission, when such determination and order are made, to notify the parties concerned, and, if necessary, enforce the same by writ of mandamus in the courts of the United States, in the name of the United States, at the relation of either of said communication commissioners. The commissioners may institute any inquiry, upon their own motion, in the same manner and to the same effect as though complaint had been made.

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

Transfer of Functions

Duties, powers, and functions under this section relating to operation of telegraph lines by railroad and telegraph lines granted Government aid in

Construction

of their lines imposed on and vested in Federal Communications Commission by act June 19, 1934. See section 601 of this title.

§11 Powers of Federal Communications Commission