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Thread: Supreme Court overturns ban on direct corporate spending on elections

  1. #1

    Exclamation Supreme Court overturns ban on direct corporate spending on elections

    http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-a...,4141508.story

    latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-na-court-corporations22-2010jan22,0,4141508.story
    latimes.com
    Supreme Court overturns ban on direct corporate spending on elections
    In a 5-4 decision that strikes down a 1907 law, the justices say the 1st Amendment gives corporations, just like individuals, a right to spend their own money on political ads for federal candidates.

    By David G. Savage

    9:28 AM PST, January 21, 2010

    Reporting from Washington
    Quantcast

    The Supreme Court today overturned a century-old restriction on corporations using their money to sway federal elections and ruled that companies have a free-speech right to spend as much as they wish to persuade voters to elect or defeat candidates for Congress and the White House.

    In a 5-4 decision, the court's conservative bloc said corporations have the same 1st Amendment rights as individuals and, for that reason, the government may not stop corporations from spending freely to influence the outcome of federal elections.

    The decision is probably the most sweeping and consequential handed down under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. And the outcome may well have an immediate impact on this year's mid-term elections to Congress.

    Until now, corporations and unions have been barred from spending their own treasury funds on broadcast ads or billboards that urge the election or defeat of a federal candidate. This restriction dates back to 1907, when President Theodore Roosevelt called on Congress to forbid corporations, railroads and national banks from using their money in federal election campaigns. After World War II, Congress extended this ban to labor unions.

    In today's decision, the high court struck down that restriction and said the 1st Amendment gives corporations, just like individuals, a right to spend their own money on political ads.

    "The 1st Amendment does not permit Congress to make these categorical distinctions based on the corporate identity of the speaker and the content of the political speech," said Justice Anthony M. Kennedy for the court.

    Two significant prohibitions on corporations were left standing. Corporations, and presumably unions, cannot give money directly to the campaigns of federal candidates. These "contribution" restrictions were not challenged in the case decided today. And secondly, the court affirmed current federal rules which require the sponsors of political ads to disclose who paid for them.

    Most election-law expert have predicted a court decision freeing corporations will send millions of extra dollars flooding into this fall's contests for Congress. And they predict Republicans will be the main beneficiaries.

    Today's decision was supported by five justices who were Republican nominees. They include Kennedy and Roberts along with Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

    The dissenters included the three Democratic appointees: Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor. They joined a dissent written by 89-year old Justice John Paul Stevens. Speaking from the bench, he called today's decision "a radical change in the law ... that dramatically enhances the role of corporations and unions -- and the narrow interests they represent -- in determining who will hold public office."

    The decision today, though long forecast, displayed a deep division of opinion on the court about the meaning of the 1st Amendment and freedom of speech. The majority said the Constitution broadly protected discussion and debate on politics, regardless of who was paying for the speech. Roberts said he was not prepared to "embrace a theory of the 1st Amendment that would allow censorship not only of television and radio broadcasts, but of pamphlets, posters, the Internet and virtually any other medium that corporations and unions might find useful in expressing their views on matters of public concern."

    But Stevens and the dissenters said the majority was ignoring the long-understood rule that the government could limit election money from corporations, unions and others, such as foreign governments. "Under today's decision, multinational corporations controlled by foreign governments" would have the same rights as Americans to spend money to tilt U.S. elections. "Corporations are not human beings. They can't vote and can't run for office," Stevens said, and should be subject to restrictions under the election laws.

    Today's opinion dealt only with corporations, but its logic would suggest that unions will also have the same right in the future to spend unions funds on ad campaigns for federal candidates.

    david.savage@latimes.com



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  3. #2
    This is hugely important.

    And eliminates all hope I had....
    Why can't everybody else leave everybody else alone?

  4. #3

    Exclamation poor teddy kennedy passed away last summer... 52% of a vote ain't a landslide...

    potus Teddy R. is spinning in his grave as is his cousin franklin delano also sorta, mayhap!
    and PRESIDENT william mckinley rules ALL from his lofty resting place in canton ohio...
    even if she dissented, how did NY state's most recent addition to our court go?

  5. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by MsDoodahs View Post
    This is hugely important.

    And eliminates all hope I had....
    I heard they still had limits like individuals do. Any truth to this?

  6. #5
    good Q! populists, progressives and new deal democrats
    may have heart attacks over the shock of all this!!!!!

  7. #6
    freedom won today. now lets continue to march together.

  8. #7
    or...

    ....if...

    not

    .......O!

    my

    gAWd


    this is
    a

    true
    paradigm
    shift!!!

  9. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by ItsTime View Post
    I heard they still had limits like individuals do. Any truth to this?
    Corps and unions have no limits - that would limit their freedom of speech.

    Limits are for us lowly subjects.

    we are soooo.... screwed!

    I don't see why they even bother having elections with this precident in place - why not just rotate the CEO's the the Fortune 50 through the office of the president and make him a dictator. The result is the same.

    We might as well give up and start looking for another country to migrate to - This is GAME OVER!

    -t



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  11. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by tangent4ronpaul View Post
    Corps and unions have no limits - that would limit their freedom of speech.

    Limits are for us lowly subjects.
    Source?

  12. #10
    You guys and gals do realize that this is yet another issue with no black and white. A win for free speach and the consitution may also bring more corruption.

    I say its a good ruling.

    Sincerely,

    Slutter McGee

  13. #11
    Chester Copperpot
    Member

    everybody just needs to incorporate themselves... Michael Mitrosky Inc. thats it... now you can donate all you want.. $#@! em!

  14. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Mike Mitrosky View Post
    everybody just needs to incorporate themselves... Michael Mitrosky Inc. thats it... now you can donate all you want.. $#@! em!
    I was thinking that. Or if there are corp limits just make 1000000 corps.

  15. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by ItsTime View Post
    Source?
    See the original thread.

    Corporations are artificial people. They have more rights than individuals and are not hed responsible to the extent individuals are. Their effect in politics is disastrous to the economy and freedom. This is legalizing and encouraging bribery. There is no way the donations from the vast majority of the population have a chance of compeating with a major corporation. They have absolutely NO business in politics.

    -t

  16. #14
    I'm disgusted.
    Why can't everybody else leave everybody else alone?

  17. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by tangent4ronpaul View Post
    See the original thread.

    Corporations are artificial people. They have more rights than individuals and are not hed responsible to the extent individuals are. Their effect in politics is disastrous to the economy and freedom. This is legalizing and encouraging bribery. There is no way the donations from the vast majority of the population have a chance of compeating with a major corporation. They have absolutely NO business in politics.

    -t
    I did thats why Im questioning it.

    http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showpos...67&postcount=7

  18. #16
    The focus should be on the PARTY donations/lobbying... huge amounts in that the candidates can't raise in their own district. The Wealth and Corporatism controls the puppets. It's the domination of a government by corporations of the politically connected/controlled, combined with bellicose nationalism.

    SO I'm amused in the near future... at the new ending of political campaign commercials... We're AFSCME or SEIU or AFL-CIO, or UAW, EXXON, Goldman Sachs, or whatever.... and we approve of this political endorsement/message.

    It's 110% a FASCIST STATE.
    Last edited by HOLLYWOOD; 01-21-2010 at 12:40 PM.
    The American Dream, Wake Up People, This is our country! <===click

    "All eyes are opened, or opening to the rights of man, let the annual return of this day(July 4th), forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them."
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    June 1826



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  20. #17
    Aratus, knock the spam off.

    Either way, this is a good thing; hopefully individual limits will be changed/altered as well.

  21. #18
    They still cannot donate to campaigns if I read that correctly. The MSM corporations have been giving away airtime to candidates for free anyway. Now they just don't have to pretend to be unbiased and other corps can join the fun.
    Member of Ron Paul Forums Double Flat Tariff Only Society - Working towards eliminating all the foreign producer/outsource subsidizing internal federal taxes in favor of an across the board flat tariff applied equally to every country and every product.

  22. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by ItsTime View Post
    http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=227555

    post 9

    -t

  23. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by tangent4ronpaul View Post
    Thanks. Good news is I already own a few corps

  24. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by sratiug View Post
    They still cannot donate to campaigns if I read that correctly. The MSM corporations have been giving away airtime to candidates for free anyway. Now they just don't have to pretend to be unbiased and other corps can join the fun.
    Yep. This could be a good thing. I mean, corporations are already buying off legislators via other means. At least this way it'll be out in the open which critters are owned by which corporations. Now where did I put that branding iron?

  25. #22

  26. #23

  27. #24
    Fascism is awesome. Don't you all think this is awesome? Everyone knows a corporation is an individual with rights, it's not made up of individuals who have rights, for in the new world they will have none anyways! Duh! I gotta go puke I'll be right back.
    Last edited by NerveShocker; 01-21-2010 at 01:35 PM.



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  29. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by sarahgop View Post
    freedom won today. now lets continue to march together.
    None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.
    — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
    The wisdom of Swordy:

    On bringing the troops home
    Quote Originally Posted by Swordsmyth View Post
    They are coming home, all the naysayers said they would never leave Syria and then they said they were going to stay in Iraq forever.

    It won't take very long to get them home but it won't be overnight either but Iraq says they can't stay and they are coming home just like Trump said.

    On fighting corruption:
    Quote Originally Posted by Swordsmyth View Post
    Trump had to donate the "right way" and hang out with the "right people" in order to do business in NYC and Hollyweird and in order to investigate and expose them.
    Fascism Defined

  30. #26
    We're gonna have to kick the moneybombs up a notch! We gotta compete with Goldman Sachs PAC now.

    It's very telling when a law thats OVER 100 YEARS OLD is struck down. The days of the republic are almost done.
    "Let it not be said that we did nothing."-Ron Paul

    "We have set them on the hobby-horse of an idea about the absorption of individuality by the symbolic unit of COLLECTIVISM. They have never yet and they never will have the sense to reflect that this hobby-horse is a manifest violation of the most important law of nature, which has established from the very creation of the world one unit unlike another and precisely for the purpose of instituting individuality."- A Quote From Some Old Book

  31. #27

  32. #28
    Like it or not, this was the pro-freedom decision. Corporations are not "people," but they are groups of people, and even the biggest and richest group of people has the right to put up whatever ad or billboard it wants. Sorry, folks.

    Of course, it's not pro-democracy, but that just shows the whole problem with democracy. No matter what you do, it democracy devolves into oligarchy. And even if it didn't, it would just be tyranny of the majority; how is that better than tyranny by businesses or anything else?

    Besides it's not like political ads aren't already funded by big business through PAC contributions. Might as well bring it more out in the open. Prohibitions don't help. They just drive it all underground. If the people really gave a damn, they'd vote for politicians who demonstrated that they didn't have big corporate backing.

  33. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by NYgs23 View Post
    Like it or not, this was the pro-freedom decision. Corporations are not "people," but they are groups of people, and even the biggest and richest group of people has the right to put up whatever ad or billboard it wants. Sorry, folks.

    Of course, it's not pro-democracy, but that just shows the whole problem with democracy. No matter what you do, it democracy devolves into oligarchy. And even if it didn't, it would just be tyranny of the majority; how is that better than tyranny by businesses or anything else?

    Besides it's not like political ads aren't already funded by big business through PAC contributions. Might as well bring it more out in the open. Prohibitions don't help. They just drive it all underground. If the people really gave a damn, they'd vote for politicians who demonstrated that they didn't have big corporate backing.

    I see this as Individualism vs Collectivism.. this is the biggest freedom issue right now and right now you're siding with the collectivists. Moving rights towards the group and away from the individual is dangerous business in my book which is what I am seeing in this country widespread.
    Last edited by NerveShocker; 01-21-2010 at 02:18 PM.

  34. #30
    Supreme Court Drop-Kicks McCain-Feingold Act!
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