http://detnews.com/article/20090707/...nding-may-fallMichigan case limiting election funding may fall
In decision to revisit related case, High Court questions 1990 ruling on corporate spending
Gordon Trowbridge / Detroit News Washington Bureau
Washington -- The U.S. Supreme Court appears ready to overturn a 1990 decision in a Michigan case that put strict limits on the ability of corporations to try to influence elections.
In an order last week that got little notice outside a circle of court watchers and campaign-finance experts, the court announced it would rehear arguments in another election case, and asked the parties in that dispute to argue whether it should overturn the 1990 case, in which the court upheld a Michigan law that barred political spending directly from a corporation's general fund.
In overturning the Michigan case, the court could dismantle a framework that has for decades governed corporate involvement in campaigns, forcing them to establish separate political action committees that limit their ability to spend large sums supporting or opposing candidates.
"The stakes are whether this Supreme Court will roll back more than 100 years of restrictions on corporate involvement in elections," said Laura MacCleery of the Brennan Center for Justice, which advocates limits on the influence of money in elections.
John Samples, a campaign finance expert at the libertarian Cato Ins ute, said the threat to fair elections is far less than the damage to free speech by such campaign restrictions. "Many corporations don't even have political action committees now. If they wanted to spend more money now, they could do that," he said.
Both sides of the campaign finance debate agree it's likely the court will overhaul, if not completely toss out, the precedent it set in 1990. The justices could have issued a narrow ruling in the case now before them, but instead took the unusual step of ordering new arguments in September, something they would be unlikely to do unless there was a likelihood the old case would be overturned.
Two justices who dissented in the 1990 ruling -- Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy -- still sit on the high court.
Justices John Roberts, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito are also considered likely to favor overturning the ruling.
In the Michigan case, the state Chamber of Commerce challenged a state law that barred it from buying newspaper ads in a state legislative race. In an opinion written by Justice Thurgood Marshall, the court upheld the law and ruled that corporations' ability to amass large sums of money would tilt the political process too far in their favor.
"It's very significant, at least at the time I thought so," said Louis Caruso, a retired Lansing attorney who argued the case as Michigan's solicitor general.
Bob LaBrant, the state chamber's top attorney, said the chamber still believes its free-speech rights en le it to use its general-fund money for political spending.
The chamber is likely to submit a friend-of-the-court brief asking the court to overturn its earlier ruling.
"We're just glad we lived long enough to see it reversed," he said.
It would seem this is a state issue by context, but my question is, is there a limit to similar corporate funding in other states?
Seems to me this is a no-brainer in that we as a people should not want our politicians elected on the unlimited funds of corporate sponsorships who they would then be beholden to.
, I can't tell WHO the politicians/corporations are beholden to - seems to be simply a mutual admiration society. The power being amassed in Washington (and in the Presidency specifically) is unbelievable - I'm numb to it now. Frankly, I'm for ANYTHING that decentralizes power. If corporations holding undue influence over some elected officials slows the ideological agenda being rammed upon us all right now; I'm all for it.
Interesting take. I can see the logic, but I can see the overwhelming abuse associated. It would seem to me the bad would far outweigh the good.
But I do see your point.
You'd be wrong about that.
Santa Clara County vs. Southern Pacific Railroad(1886) has been held to have established that corporations were persons en led to equal protection under the 14th Amendment, and Buckley vs. Valeo (1976) held
that money was the equivalent of free speech so that expenditures of money from a political candidate’s own resources or the resources of independent organizations not related to the candidate’s campaign could not be restricted by the laws governing elections. In 1978 the U.S. Supreme Court decided that corporations were en led to this free speech right to give money to political causes.
In a dissenting opinion Chief Justice Rehnquist (after referring to the flawed precedent of Santa Clara vs. The Southern Pacific R.R) said:
“This Court….decided at an early date, with neither argument nor discussion, that a business corporation is a ‘person’ en led to the protection of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.”
The liberty of *the money interest*, as Lincoln put it, to participate freely in politics is of relatively recent vintage.
Slavery is the legal fictionthat a Person is Property.Corporate Personhood is the legalfiction that Property is a Person.
I'm sure there's a good reason why corporations are considered as people. I'm not quite sure what it is though.
Here is your reason as I learned it from a video game...
...but I remember it a little differently than Google does...Corporation: An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility.
-Ambrose Bierce
Corporation: An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.
Performance of commercial activities, like sole proprietors, legal liability, etc.... all makes sense as the basis of fictive corporate personhood.
But equal protection under the 14th Amendment -- like freed slaves -- is not an irresistible conclusion, and was mischievously established as a precedent.
The danger of corporate personhood is obvious. Corporate persons are potentially immortal, and if allowed to participate unlimitedly in electoral politcs will tend to take it over.
The wisdom of the 19th century saw this clearly. States restricted the out of corporations w/r/t politics, and Texas still has some of the toughest laws on the books.
It doesn't fly with me either, but that has long been decided by the courts. Since a corporation is a group of people who form for a common goal, my viewpoint is that 100% of that group of people would have to agree for it to be considered freedom of speech. Otherwise the majority is using the funding of the minority for things they disagree with. I'd say that's a violation of their rights. I feel the same way about unions spending money in politics.
Didn't you see the Rehnquist blurb above?It doesn't fly with me either, but that has long been decided by the courts.
The case law is weak. Obiter dicta from Santa Clara were given precedential value. A narrow, technical ruling has been treated in law as if it touched the cons utional merits. It did not.
Have those two ever been separate?
Roe v. Wade, civil rights law and any number of controversial things are *settled law* too.
Does that mean they that they may not be revisited by the courts or deserve deference from private citizens in online discussions?
It seems to me you gave up a little too easily on this question, WC.
But..but..what's good for a company is good for free enterprise, no?
Vestige of the populist era, no doubt.The wisdom of the 19th century saw this clearly. States restricted the out of corporations w/r/t politics, and Texas still has some of the toughest laws on the books.
Undoubtedly. But this may conflict with what's good for republican government and society at large.But..but..what's good for a company is good for free enterprise, no?
Those individuals should be free to spend their money to support that which they wish to in politics, and they obviously can in other ways outside of a corporation in which they hold an interest.
Well, I was thinking that it is not, as companies routinely seek favors from their favorite politicians to stifle compe ion through regulation, subsidies, etc...
If I had my druthers, any corporate participation in politics whatsoever would be eliminated.
Good point.
I meant it is good from the standpoint of "free enterprise" as a pro-corporate ideology, as commonly understood. There's no doubt the business lobbies can secure much through the legislative process that is contrary to free compe ion and free trade.
That always seems to be difficult for some to understand, on the left as well on the right.
I dont believe they (ie politicians) missed that point so much as they ignore it and remember which side their bread is buttered on and by whom, specifically.
But elections really matter, right?
George Carlin is spinning right now
Well, elections do matter for some. We're screwed regardless. At least until the Democratic-Republican Party goes away. Well, that's assuming we don't end up with something worse, but at least there won't be any false advertising then.
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