[ad_1]
\n<\/p>\n
January 15, 2020, 8:33 PM<\/p>\n
3 min read<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. —
\nFlorida lawmakers are transmitting a news bulletin: The telegraph era is over.<\/p>\n
\nBefore there was instant messaging, emails and even corded telephones, there was the reliable telegraph to instantaneously transmit messages far and wide. Now, people turn to the internet, text messaging, Twitter, gifs and emojis to write their long-distance notes.<\/p>\n
\nWhile thumbing through a volume of Florida laws, state Rep. Tommy Gregory and a colleague came upon old statutes regulating the telegraph industry. <\/p>\n
\n\u201cI wondered if they were now obsolete,\u201d said Gregory, a former lieutenant colonel in the Air Force.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWe probably haven’t sent a telegraph in the state of Florida in more than a decade,\u201d Gregory said in an interview. Indeed, it’s anybody’s guess when that final Florida missive might have been tapped into the ether. Western Union, once a leading telegraph service provider, sent out its last telegram on Jan. 27, 2006.<\/p>\n
\nGregory considered the statutes useless in today’s era of smartphones and emails, and he moved to rip the laws out of the state’s books.<\/p>\n
\nA state House committee on Wednesday agreed unanimously to repeal Chapter 363 of the Florida Statute in its entirety. One lawmaker cheekily registered his vote by using his fingers to tap into the dais as if using Morse Code.<\/p>\n
\nBack in its day, the telegraph was cutting-edge technology. Until Samuel Morse invented his eponymous code and sent out the first message by telegraph in 1844, the Pony Express was still the speediest way to get a message from coast to coast. <\/p>\n
\n“WHAT HATH GOD WROUGHT?” the first telegraph message asked.<\/p>\n
\nFor starters, fax machines, Twitter and Facebook.<\/p>\n
\nTelegram companies were once common. During America’s wars, a telegram arriving at a family’s door was a thing to be dreaded, perhaps containing the news of a beloved service member’s death. Air travel and interstate highways later made mail delivery faster and cheaper. Then the corded telephone became ubiquitous. Fax machines also became common. More recently, email and the Internet allowed for instantaneous messaging. <\/p>\n
\nThese days, smartphones have become the go-to communications tool.<\/p>\n
\nThe Florida law was adopted more than a century ago and remained mostly unchanged since 1913.<\/p>\n
\nIt established penalties against telegraph companies that refused to transmit messages, making them liable for damages for mental anguish and physical suffering because of their failure to promptly and correctly transmit or deliver a telegram.<\/p>\n
\nBased on their research, staffers concluded that \u201cthe provisions of chapter 363, F.S., are outdated and no longer applicable.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nGregory, an anti-red tape Republican, said the matter might not be urgent, but not necessarily a trivial exercise.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThis is not health care. Right. This is not an in-depth and complex legislation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cBut I think we need to reduce the footprint of government.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n(STOP)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n