Congressmen’s Phones Fail for 4th Time in 2 Weeks

The House of Representatives telephone system went dead Thursday for the fourth time in two weeks, silencing half of Congress.

The widespread outage brought howls from congressmen cut off from constituents and district offices, and prompted a scramble by officials of American Telephone & Telegraph Co., which installed the $16-million system last August, to find out what went wrong.

“I don’t know what motivated this installation of the new system, but it’s certainly proven to be a failure,” Rep. Walter B. Jones (D-N.C.) complained.

Officials in the House clerk’s office, which administers the system that has about 17,000 telephones, said they were working to find out what had gone wrong and that AT&T; had sent technical experts to help diagnose the problem.

Reminiscent of Commericals

Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.) said the glitch reminded him of the AT&T; television commercials showing distraught employees bemoaning their choice of a phone system and discussing how their businesses had been ruined. The commercials end by proclaiming AT&T; “the right choice.”

“Well, in the interest of . . . truth in advertising, I think we ought to admit that the same source of that advertising is the one that has the telephone system here in the House,” Kolbe said.

Members and staff described everything from dead telephones to intermittent operation of some lines. At times, all of the lights on a telephone would go on at once and all of the phones in an office would ring simultaneously.

An AT&T; spokesman, Herb Linnen, said the company was “totally empathetic” with lawmakers’ frustration. “We are frustrated. We have a commitment to get the . . . problem fixed as quickly as possible,” he said.