◆ SpookStack

F ied , i + at 3 an cm is ia et ec 190 2 Nardone ef at. vs. United States. 2 authorized by the sender shall intercept any communication and divulge or publish the existence, contents, substaneo, purport, ef- fect or meaning of such intereepted communication to any person: » - .” Section 501° penalizes wilful and knowing violation by fine and imprisonment, Taken at face value the phrase ‘no person?’ comprehends fed- eral agents, and the ban on communication to ‘any person’? bars testimony to the content of an intercepted message. Such an ap- plication of the section is supported by comparison of the clause concerning intereepted messages with that relatiny to those known to employes of the carrier. The former may not be divulyed to any person, the latter may be divulged in answer to a lawful subpoena. The government contends that Congress did not intend to pro- hibit tapping wires to procure evidence. It is said that this court, in Olmstead v. United States, 277 U. 8. 438, held such evidence . admissible at common law despite the fact that a state statute made wire-tapping a crime; and the argument procecds that sinee ‘the Olmstead decision departments of the federal government, with the knowledge of Congress, have, to a limited extent, per- mitted their agents to tap wires in aid of detcetion and eonvie- tion of criminals. It is shown that, in spite of its knowledge of the practice, Congress refrained from adopting legislation outlaw- ing it, although bills, so providing, have been introduced, The Communications Act, so it is claimed, was passed only for the purpose of reenacting the provisions of the Radio Act of 19274 so as to make it applicable to wire messages and to transfer jurisdic- tion over radio and wire communieations to the newly constituted Federal Communications Commission, and therefore the phraseology of the statute ought not to be construed as changing the practically identical provision on the subject which was a part of the Radio Act when the Oblnstead ease was decided. We nevertheless face the fact that the plain words of Section 605 forbid anyone, unless authorized by the sender, to interecpt a tele- phone message, and direet in equally clear language that ‘‘ne per- son’’ shall divulge or publish the message or its substance to ‘any person’’. To recite the contents of the Messige in testimony be- fore a court is to divulee the messae. The conclusion that the act forbids such testimony secs to us unshaken by the government's arguments, i # Ch, €52, 48 Stat. 1064, 1100, U.S. C. Tit. 47, § 501. #Act of Feb. 23, 1927, ch. 169, 44 Stat. 1168.