Communications Act of 1934

In 1933, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt directed Daniel Roper, the secretary of commerce, to establish a committee to conduct a study examining the issues of regulating the radio industry and auxiliary communication industries such as telephone and telegraph. The Department of Commerce’s report asserted that there was an inadequate regulatory structure in place, thus causing the president and Congress to modify the regulatory structure that had been created by the Radio Act of 1927.

In the Department of Commerce report, it highlighted the fact that the Federal Radio Commission (FRC) only had authority to regulate wireless communications and needed additional regulatory powers to provide oversight to all communication industries. Accordingly, it was recommended that regulation of both wire and wireless communications be combined under one ...