Today the Supreme Court will hear arguments again, in a case that could reverse major gains made in recent decades to reduce the influence of corporate money on federal elections.
The court heard this case last June, but in a surprising move, Chief Justice Roberts said that it would rehear it and also reconsider two previous landmark campaign finance cases. In other words, the Supreme Court has transformed a case that posed a limited challenge to the McCain-Feingold law into a sweeping challenge to a century old support of campaign finance restrictions on direct corporate financing of candidate campaigns.
Since 1907, the United States has recognized that corporations have certain rights, but they are not citizens, they do not vote, so those rights can be limited.
Corporate campaign contributions were banned in federal elections in 1907 and in 1947, the law was amended to affirm what had been understood to be the case.
It would not take too many $10 million campaigns by a corporation to defeat a House member who voted against that corporation or establish a threat to obtain undue influence over other House members.
The issue is the First Amendment right of free speech. Conservatives who oppose campaign finance regulation argue that corporations have the same right to free speech and to political speech as anybody else does.
The First Amendment gives people rights, no place in the Bill of Rights does it give any rights to a corporation. With our current conservative court, we could see corporations gain even more power.
Jock
