In United States
telecommunication
Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than tha ...
law, the Modification of Final Judgment (MFJ) is the August 1982
consent decree concerning the
American Telephone & Telegraph Company
AT&T Corporation, originally the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is the subsidiary of AT&T Inc. that provides voice, video, data, and Internet telecommunications and professional services to businesses, consumers, and government agen ...
(AT&T) and its subsidiaries. The terms required the
Bell System divestiture – removing local telephone service from AT&T control and putting business restrictions on the divested local telephone companies – in exchange for removing other longstanding restrictions on what businesses AT&T could control.
The decree replaced the entirety of the previous final judgment of January 24, 1956 in the case
''United States of America v. Western Electric Company, Incorporated, and American Telephone and Telegraph Company'',
[Modification of Final Judgement](_blank)
(archived scan) in ''United States of America v. Western Electric Company, Incorporated, and American Telephone and Telegraph Company''. United States District Court for the District of Columbia, Civil Action No. 82-0192, filed August 24, 1982. Retrieved 2019-01-29. also known as ''United States v. Western Electric Co.''
which had been transferred to the
United States District Court for the District of Columbia
The United States District Court for the District of Columbia (in case citations, D.D.C.) is a United States district court, federal district court in the District of Columbia. It also occasionally handles (jointly with the United States Dist ...
and is referred to in the MFJ as the ''Western Electric'' case,
[ Copy of full opinion accompanying the Modification of Final Judgment.] and consolidated with the existing ''
United States v. AT&T'' filed on November 20, 1974, which is referred to in the MFJ as the ''AT&T'' action
or ''AT&T'' case.
The decree was made with
Harold H. Greene as presiding judge.
References
{{Telecommunications
1982 in technology
1982 in United States case law
Bell System
United States antitrust case law
United States communications regulation case law