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Congress meant for the phrase “public switched network” to
carry the more restrictive meaning attributed to it by mobile
petitioners, Congress could (and presumably would) have
used the more limited—and more precise—term “public
switched telephone network.” Indeed, Congress used that
precise formulation in another, later-enacted statute. See 18
U.S.C. § 1039(h)(4). Here, though, Congress elected to use
the more general term “public switched network,” which by
its plain language can reach beyond telephone networks
alone. See 2015 Open Internet Order, 30 FCC Rcd. at 5783
¶ 396.
Not only did Congress decline to invoke the term “public
switched telephone network,” but it also gave the
Commission express authority to define the broader term it
used instead. See 47 U.S.C. § 332(d)(2). Mobile petitioners
conceive of “public switched network” as a term of art
referring only to a network using telephone numbers. But if
that were so, it is far from clear why Congress would have
invited the Commission to define the term, rather than simply
setting out its ostensibly fixed meaning in the statute. We
instead agree with the Commission that, in granting the
Commission general definitional authority, Congress
“expected the notion [of the public switched network] to
evolve and therefore charged the Commission with the
continuing obligation to define it.” 2015 Open Internet Order,
30 FCC Rcd. at 5783 ¶ 396.
It is of no moment that Congress, in another statute, used
the term “public switched network” in a context indicating an
intention to refer to the telephone network. See 47 U.S.C.
§ 1422(b)(1)(B)(ii) (referring to “the public Internet or the
public switched network”). That statute, unlike section
332(d)(2), contains no grant of authority to the Commission to
define the term. And it was enacted during the time when the
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