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marmar

(76,982 posts)
Sun Feb 26, 2012, 12:10 PM Feb 2012

United Citizens vs. Citizens United


from In These Times:



United Citizens vs. Citizens United
Two years after the infamous ruling, support builds for a constitutional amendment.

BY Sady Doyle


Reader: I have a confession to make. I am not a lawyer. Nor am I a constitutional law scholar, a person who has studied in great detail the differences in disclosure requirements between nonprofits and for-profit corporations, or a person who reads articles with the word “finance” in the first paragraph. My chief interest with money lies in whether I have enough of it to survive. In this, I am not unlike many Americans, all of whom are affected by the 2010 Supreme Court decision, Citizens United v. FEC. All of us have good reason to be invested in the fight to overturn that decision and ensure that corporate money does not control our election system.

The Citizens United ruling is notorious. Its immediate effect was to nullify key portions of the bipartisan campaign reform law known as “McCain-Feingold,” which regulated spending by outside special interest groups trying to influence elections. The Court held that such spending by corporations – whether for-profit or nonprofit – constitutes political “speech” that cannot be restrained under the First Amendment. So, Congress cannot limit spending in elections, such as to support or denounce candidates, even though corporations cannot give money directly to a candidate. As for the long-term impact… well, that’s where we leave simplicity behind.

One example of popular resistance to the Citizens United ruling comes from Rep. Ted Deutch (D-Fla.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). They have proposed the same constitutional amendment in their respective houses – Deutch’s “Outlawing Corporate Cash Undermining the Public Interest in Our Elections and Democracy” amendment, introduced in November; and Sanders’ “Saving American Democracy” amendment, introduced in December – both of them brief, identical and deceptively simple.

Every word of these proposed amendments is important. The ramifications of the Citizens United decision are so complex that an average American voter can easily become lost trying to understand what’s at stake. Having the issue boiled down into a slogan may seem helpful, but it doesn’t do so much to educate those who haven’t already made up their minds. So, let’s start, as any good conversation should, with why those of us who are uninitiated should care. .............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/12695/united_citizens_vs._icitizens_united_i



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