Docket 20777: the mother of all anti-AM FCC proposals

[k4kyv]

Let's have a brief history lesson.

Some  readers may remember Docket 20777, first introduced to the amateur
community by Johnny Johnston at the FCC Forum at Dayton in 1976.  This was
one of the first of a long series of dockets and petitions to eliminate or
restrict the use of AM on the amateur frequencies, and demonstrates why some AM enthusiasts who have been on the air for a certain number of years become very defensive on the subject of restricting AM privileges, to the point of what some may see as paranoia.

Under the guise of  "deregulation", the FCC would have outlawed AM on all
amateur frequencies below 28.5 mHz.  It is remarkably similar to the recent
ill-fated ARRL bandwidth petition, but without a "footnote" to preserve AM
privileges.

For many AM'ers on the air to-day, this proposal is ancient history
predating their living memory, or they have never heard of it.  For others,
it is a vague memory but the details have become lost.  FYI, here is the
full text of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking as it appeared in April,
1976.

Note the heading: "In the Matter of Deregulation of Part 97... "

Pay particular attention to paragraph 5, page 2, and the first page of Appendix II.

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

Good history lesson Don. TNX! Most don't remember how close we can to losing this mode. Stay vigilant and active!

[KL7OF]

Don....What prompted you to bring this up now?.....Am I missing something....Steve

[k4kyv]

Don....What prompted you to bring this up now?.....Am I missing something....Steve

This thread, the topic of "deregulation" and when it first appeared as a buzzword in Washington circles.  Apparently someone thought the topic was getting too "political" and some of the  messages evaporated.

It got me thinking about the old cliché that those who forget history are condemned to repeat it.

[KL7OF]

thanks

[K1ZJH]

Due vigilance...

[ka3zlr]

So who's taking Rileys place..? we gotta check that guy out...in terms of mode interests...

[Opcom]

Other adverse proposals and dockets are worth mentioning in the spirit of vigilance.

The ARRL tried in proposal RM-11306 to do away with ISB recently (over my dead Harris!) as well as inferring between the lines that the usual "AM equivalent" (carrier+1 sideband) mode some tranceivers use would be alike in BW to an arbitrary ssb-like traditional value, when it is on average 300Hz wider due to the carrier at 0 Hz offset.

Silly boogers been reading the gradeschool radio books again. Don't they have the works of Terman in the shack there? I don't care that there are very few hams ready to talk with me using ISB, but I do care when 'groups' pop up and try to place arbitrary limits or make unreasonable changes with no technical grounding on historically acceptable operations, or try to get rid of modes they know little about or don't care about. In proposal RM-11306 the ARRL also wanted to give PACTORIII the privelege to be run anywhere in the band, like a crack pimp on main street. It took some really well thought out counterstatements by one ham to completely refute the need for that bit of nonsense.

There's no excuse for the elimination of any mode that can be used cleanly or reasonably. A friend recently demonstrated a PW CW spark transmitter on 10GHz operated perfectly within the rules. Modes should be added to the arsenal, not removed.

There were several proposals aboutt he CW requirement issue. I don't recall all the #'s, but I got a bunch of nasty little e-mails from fascists after posting in usenet of one of these insidious plots / incompetent proposals. I was accused of "stirring up the masses" and "banding together the amateur community" (How ridiculous to think I could architect something so grand with the meager tools at my disposal)

Well the ham community needed to be stirred up on each of the issues, and by whatever means they did wake up and they wrote to the FCC in high numbers on all these matters. The few hateful or ignorant people must have thought if they were loud enough or trumped up some unsupported but good looking data, that their agendas would be swallowed in a single gulp.

We should recall all the positive support from the amateur community at large that AM and "HF-sans-code test" has received throughout those tribulations, much of it from those who use CW mainly or don't use AM often; and who are just decent, reasonable, freedom-loving hams like most of us hopefully are. Vigilance.