47 U.S.C. § 537
Section 537 · Sales of cable systems
Amended 3 times on record
Applied in 8 court decisions — leading case Allegheny Defense Project v. FERC (2020)
Most recently applied in Allegheny Defense Project v. FERC (June 2020)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
A franchising authority shall, if the franchise requires franchising authority approval of a sale or transfer, have 120 days to act upon any request for approval of such sale or transfer that contains or is accompanied by such information as is required in accordance with Commission regulations and by the franchising authority. If the franchising authority fails to render a final decision on the request within 120 days, such request shall be deemed granted unless the requesting party and the franchising authority agree to an extension of time.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Amendments
1996—Pub. L. 104–104 redesignated subsec. (e) as entire section, substituted “A franchising authority” for “Limitation on Duration of Franchising Authority Power To Disapprove Transfers.—In the case of any sale or transfer of ownership of any cable system after the 36-month period following acquisition of such system, a franchising authority”, and struck out subsecs. (a) to (d) which related to three-year holding period requirement, treatment of multiple transfers, exceptions to holding requirement, and waiver authority.
Effective Date
Section effective 60 days after Oct. 5, 1992, see section 28 of Pub. L. 102–385, set out as an Effective Date of 1992 Amendment note under section 325 of this title.