Telephone News System, Inc. v. Illinois Bell Telephone Co., 376 U.S. 782 (1964)

One-line per curiam order of 6 April 1964 affirming the three-judge court's decision that upheld the Wire Act's cut-off provision as applied to a Chicago racing-information telephone service.

Date: 1964-04-06
Kind: court-opinion
Source: CourtListener (Free Law Project), text of the opinion
Retrieved: 2026-10-12
Docket: No. 772
Rights: Opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States, a federal work in the public domain under 17 U.S.C. § 105. CourtListener (Free Law Project) hosts the text; it is not the source institution.

Decided April 6, 1964, on appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. The order reads, in full: “The judgment is affirmed.” Thomas D. Nash, Jr. appeared for the appellant; Solicitor General Cox for the United States; and Walter J. Cummings, Jr. for Illinois Bell. “Mr. Justice Douglas is of the opinion that probable jurisdiction should be noted.”

A summary affirmance gives no reasons. The reasoning is in the district court’s opinion.

itemTelephone News System, Inc. v. Illinois Bell Telephone Co., 220 F. Supp. 621 (N.D. Ill. 1963)Three-judge district court decision of 14 August 1963 rejecting constitutional challenges to the Wire Act's cut-off provision, 18 U.S.C. § 1084(d), as applied to a Chicago telephone service that played recorded horse-racing information to callers.itemWire Act: 75 Stat. 491 (Public Law 87-216), 13 September 1961, adding 18 U.S.C. 1084The 1961 Act adding 18 U.S.C. 1084, which made it a crime for a person in the business of betting or wagering knowingly to use a wire communication facility to transmit bets, wagers or wagering information across state or national lines.