In the past 24 hours, there have been a series of developments in reaction to the ruling by afederal judge in Oklahoma City that the Federal Trade Commission overstepped its authority in creating the national "Do-Not-Call" registry.

On Tuesday, September 23, U.S. District Judge Lee R. West ruled that the Federal Trade Commission did not have “authority to promulgate a national do-not-call registry.”

The registry had been scheduled to go into effect on October 1.

Intense pressure is being brought on Members of Congress to quickly pass legislation to effectively overturn the decision. Late Wednesday, Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, who is chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, introduced bills to give the FTC explicit authority to create and operate the list.

Tauzin spokesman Ken Johnson said the House would waste no time in considering the measure and “if the Senate follows suit we'll have this problem solved by the close of business on Thursday.”

Please stay tuned to PIANET for further analysis and detail as this issue unfolds.

September 25, 2003