Justice Roberts is Wrong. Money and Speech are not the Same.

[GoLeft TV]

From Ring of Fire:

Yesterday, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in McCutcheon v. Federal Elections Commission (McCutcheon) and decided to strike down the aggregate limits on campaign finance contributions. The reasoning, according to Justice John Roberts, who delivered the Court’s opinion along with Justices Scalia, Kennedy, and Alito, is that the right to spend money on elections is the same as the freedom to speak.

Justice Roberts is either naive or misguided and neither option is becoming of the nation’s highest legal authority.

The political landslide that has been won in the Court started with Citizens United, a case that, in the view of the nation, was horribly unpopular. This decision put the nation on a crash-course with the devastation that awaits unbridled and unchecked spending by corporations and private interests in our national discussions and elections.

In the words of the dissenting opinion in McCutcheon, delivered by Justice Breyer, along with Justices Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan, “Taken together with Citizens United…, today’s decision eviscerates our Nation’s campaign finance laws, leaving a remnant incapable of dealing with the grave problems of democratic legitimacy that those laws were intended to resolve.”

You can read the full article here at Ring of Fire.

[underpants]

1. Robert's Rules of Money in Politics

“It’s like the definition of chutzpah: the guy who kills his parents and asks for mercy from the court because he’s an orphan,” said Larry Norden of the Brennan Center for Justice, which favors tighter campaign finance regulation. “Look at what the court has done since 2007 after Roberts came on board, one case after another gradually striking down the laws that are in place and then claiming that, therefore, more has to be done. It’s nonsensical.”

“Of course, this was the majority’s own creation,” said Rick Hasen, an election law expert and University of California-Irvine law dean. Hasen said Roberts’s opinion fits a pattern in which he insists the court is only changing campaign finance law at the margins, when the ultimate impact is likely to be much more dramatic.

“The opinion we saw today is vintage Roberts in trying to downplay the seriousness with which he’s changing the law. It’s like: ‘There’s nothing to see here, folks,” the said. “It’s another way he paints himself as an incrementalist when in fact it’s quite serious.”


Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/04/john-roberts-supreme-court-mccutcheon-105331.html#ixzz2xq6hAbcc

[geckosfeet]

2. We have come to point where our judges would have us believe that commerce, the buying and selling

of property is speech.

While I think that how I spend money says something about me I certainly do not think that I speak by spending money. I may choose to spend money on one thing or another according to my beliefs, but this is distinctly different than speaking.

How is it that money has come to mean speech.

[flpoljunkie]

3. If money is 'speech,' then those with no money have no voice

[3catwoman3]

4. Precisely.

So much for "one man, one vote."

[onenote]

5. If money isn't speech, then the government could make it illegal for people to

donate even a dime to a political candidate or to spend money to put up signs that they make themselves. The issue isn't whether money is speech; its whether speech in the form of contributions of money can be regulated because there is a compelling government interest in avoiding not only corruption of the political process, but even the appearance of corruption. The court got it wrong because they ignored the real risk of corruption from getting rid of the overall limits (even if there continue to be individual limits).

When I give money to support DU or the ACLU or other political organization, I'm engaging in a protected exercise of my speech rights.

[flpoljunkie]

7. Donating money is just that--donating money. It is not speech.

[onenote]

11. That's like saying "burning a flag is just that-burning a flag. It is not speech"

The act of burning a flag is an expressive act. So too, like it or not, is the act of giving money to a political party, a political candidate, an entity that engages in political speech like DU or move on or the aclu, etc.

That doesn't mean that every expressive act is entitled to absolute protection. You're protected in your right to burn a flag, but not at a gas station. Giving money to support a political candidate or to support a group that works to achieve political ends that you support is protected speech. The question, however, is whether there are circumstances where that speech poses risks that justify the imposition on the exercise of that particular form of expression. Where the expression leads to corruption or an appearance of corruption, then limiting the expression can be justified.

[flpoljunkie]

12. You said it well in your last sentence

Though it's hard to argue our system is not hopelessly corrupt.

[Iceberg Louie]

6. Roberts must assume the "little people" are really dumb

Only a complete imbecile would view the contention that "money equals speech" as anything but Orwellian wordplay for bribery.

[Kablooie]

8. If money and speech are the same thing then speech is not free.

[DCBob]

9. Seems rather obvious to anyone without a bias in this matter.

Roberts is twisting like a pretzle to come up with an excuse for this shameless vote.

[Jakes Progress]

10. In this country. . . they are now.