The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that corporations can meddle all they want in elections. This is in spite of the fact that they aren’t real persons and cannot vote. If you had any illusions that your political representative would listen to you rather than the big corporation happily polluting your neighborhood, you can forget about it. Hamilton’s vision for America was at odds with Jefferson’s and now Hamilton’s is firmly in control.
It’s nice to think that America is the land of the free. When you look at it closely, however, you begin to see that the cards are stacked mightily against the individual. As Joe Strummer of The Clash said in the song Know Your Rights:“you have the right to free speech … as long as you’re not dumb enough to actually try it.” That is, you have the right to be counted … as long as Exxon, General Electric, and other corporations are free to count more.
A friend mentioned the infamous Santa Clara case which allegedly gave corporations the same Constitutional rights as human beings. A meaty essay discusses the case and its repercussions. I’m all for people building their own businesses but when companies help themselves to rights not granted to them in the Constitution it puts all our liberty at risk.
I support a Constitutional amendment to clear this up once and for all. Maybe some day my kids or grandkids will have a Congress that is responsive to them and not just responsive to corporations with deep pockets and the unfettered ability to buy elections.
So, are groups like MoveOn.org any different? Especially considering that MoveOn.org is backed by a gazillionaire.
What about unions?
What about a group of concerned citizens coming together and pooling their money to buy ads or hold rallies for politicians? The group just happens to be a bunch of billionaires. Is that wrong too?
Let’s say you got your wish and they couldn’t buy ads or participate in the political process. They could still influence elections with their money and influence individual congress critters. It wouldn’t stop that at all. Cronyism is here to stay while the current group of politicians, Democrats and Republicans both, are still in power.
Ok, Mr. so-called Libertarian: corporations are not mentioned anywhere in the Constitution. Give me an argument that shows how the Constitution’s protections apply to them.
while you didn’t address my counter points, I am a libertarian by the way, I’ll give you the first ammendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
what’s that about freedom of being able to peaceably assemble? It’s freedom of association. Look, you may not like corps having influence then friggin’ expose them. But remember, there may be companies whose policies you believe in and should they be silenced too? What about the Sierra Club? They’re not an individual? Should they be allowed to participate? Is it only organizations that you agree with that should participate?
Look, reform isn’t so bad but you got to look at everyone not just “evil” corps…
Thanks for insulting me, by the way….
First Amendment. Yep. Love it. Freedom of speech is great. Which amendment specifies that money is speech?
I’m not against corporations, or unions, or social clubs, or advocacy groups. It’s just that none of them vote, so they shouldn’t have free reign to spend money in the election process.
The Bill of Rights is a document of negative rights telling the government what it can’t do. I could turn the question back on you and ask, “Where does it say it’s NOT speech?”. Who’s to say money isn’t speech?
I think money is a good thing in the political process. Let’s say there is an issue that I’m passionate about. Say, free speech. And there’s a candidate out there who has had an anti-free speech stance in his local/state level career. Now, I’m not rich but I really want people to know about this info so I form together a group that can help raise cash so we can put together a bulletin outlining said candidates past grievances. What’s wrong with that?
But its corporate money that you have an issue with. Ok, what if GM was rolling out a bunch of new eco friendly cars and one candidate was very anti-environmentalism so they take out a tv ad pointing this out. What’s wrong with that? How does it hurt the political process? Or, the candidate is in favor of laws that would hurt GM financially and they put out an ad showing the consequences of said legislation? I don’t think that’s bad….
Democracy won’t end because of this ruling.