States: Ruling Won't Stop Their No-Call Laws

By: Barbara Powell, Associated Press Writer (AP) Mississippi and other states with laws regulating telemarketing don't expect their statutes to be affected by a federal court ruling shooting down the national do-not-call registry.

An Oklahoma federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) lacked the authority to create a national do-not-call registry that was set to be activated on Oct. 1. Mississippi's law also takes effect that day.

State officials in Mississippi, Tennessee, and Missouri noted that the Oklahoma ruling involved a legal challenge by telemarketing groups to the federal law, not to state laws.

"I've never heard of a challenge to a state-specific no-call law," said Nielsen Cochran, a Mississippi Public Service Commissioner. "And we're going straight ahead. We're not going to hesitate because of the ruling in Oklahoma City."

Telemarketers, including many newspaper publishers, oppose the federal do-not-call list, saying it will hurt their marketing efforts.

A total of 37 states, including New York, Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Missouri, have active no-calls lists or -- like Mississippi -- soon will have.

In California, Gov. Gray Davis said the state will immediately begin creating its own "list. State lawmakers approved a bill to create one in 2001, but never started compiling it, waiting instead for the federal registry to go into effect.

"We will continue the job we started two years ago," Davis said. "We will not postpone our commitment to remaining the nation's leader in privacy."

But if Wednesday's ruling withstands appeal, or if a suit filed in federal court in Denver by the American Teleservices Association succeeds, states say they wouldn't be surprised by a legal challenge from telemarketers.

"We have not had any legal challenges in the three years since our law was passed, and we would vigorously oppose any such challenges," said Scott Holste, a spokesman for the Missouri attorney general's office. Missouri leads the nation in judgments against telemarketers, having levied more than $1 million in fines in two years.

In Tennessee -- where 900,000 telephone numbers have been put on the state's no-call registry since it began three years ago -- officials issued a public warning to telemarketers not to take Wednesday's ruling as an invitation to flaunt state law.

"We feel we have a good and legally defensible position, and telemarketers need to be on notice we intend to enforce our law to the fullest extent possible," said Debi Tate, chairwoman of the Tennessee Regulatory Authority.

Another concern to states with existing telemarketing laws: Consumers have registered more than 50 million telephone numbers with the FTC, which was to have shared those numbers with the states to include in their own no-call registries. Now, those consumers, if not already registered in their own states, would have to register there if they wanted protection from telemarketing calls.

"I suggest that any consumer who only signed up on the federal list, might want to consider signing up on the state list," said Bo Robinson, a Mississippi Public Service Commissioner.

Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon even issued a statement reassuring the 1.2 million households on Missouri's no-call registry that they won't be inundated with telemarketing calls without recourse to stop them.

"I want to assure Missourians on our state's No Call team they still have protection under Missouri law," Nixon said.