Apologies if this has been or is being discussed elsewhere. If so, please point me to that thread and I’ll ask the mods to close this one.
IMO, Citizens United is one of the worst, if not the worst, decisions by the Supreme Court in my lifetime. We have all seen the ramifications of this ruling, where dark money has been poured into campaigns on both sides of the aisle. Grass-roots donations mean little these days.
Earlier this year, the Hawaii legislature passed a law that essentially states that corporations can no longer spend money on elections.
The bill takes aim at the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling, which allowed corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money in elections. Lawmakers, drawing from a legal theory developed by the Center for American Progress, argued that because states create corporations and grant them their powers, Hawaii could simply decline to grant corporations the power to spend in elections.
The law, which goes into effect on July 1, 2027, will undoubtedly be challenged in court. But at least somebody is trying to overturn a flawed decision by the nation’s highest court.
I appreciate their idealism and optimism, but it’s too late, I fear. This country has fully embraced the idea that corporations rule all, even the courts and especially the politicians.
Citizens United is not some off the wall unique ruling.
Citizens United just comes out of corporate personhood. The concept of corporate personhood is worldwide- UK, Canada, etc. Then you combine it with the Bill of Rights, which is more or less unique. Corporate personhood has been around in the US at least since the 1886 Supreme Court case Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Co. if not earlier.
Corporate personhood, combined with Bill of Rights, means Corporations has similar rights are people- including the right to donate to causes.
Natural persons and corporate persons have different rights, though. And, until CU, corporations couldn’t put unlimited money into elections. Corporations, for example, can’t vote. They don’t have a natural lifespan.
Looking at the Bill of Rights, some of them make no sense when applied to corporations – what does the right to bear arms mean in the context of a corporation? Can a corporation join a militia? So, bringing in the Bill of Rights as if that’s some deciding factor seems wrong to me.
ETA: Back to the OP, since CU was decided, SCOTUS has become even more business friendly, so this is truly a waste of time.
Three-fourths of survey respondents — including 66 percent of Republicans and 85 percent of Democrats — back a constitutional amendment outlawing Citizens United.
While I don’t see the Bill of Rights as particularly unique (he said, protected by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms), I can’t disagree with the rest of this. I can hate the decision and see all sorts of problems with arguments that two people lose their right to political speech as soon as the form an organization to protect their financial interests. I’ll be interested in seeing what arugment i made to over turn it.
I’m of the opinion it’s a worthy, if likely doomed, effort on the part of Hawaii.
We’ve had literally endless efforts by states to pass legislation by the GOP over decades challenging (and chipping away) at reproductive freedom, religious freedom (especially in schools), rights for immigrants (legal or not), etc.
Far too few efforts by Democratic lead legislatures to bring good challenges against “settled” laws, however poor the consequences may be.
I’m not advocating lawfare precisely, but I don’t think we’re ever going back to a USA where bi-partisanship is going to be a goal - the GOP has gone so far in burning and salting that ground that it’s going to be a non-starter for a long time. So since the SCOTUS has often abandoned precedent in search of GOP friendly objectives, it’s time to accept that this is now how the game will be played.
Still think it’s doomed as the SCOTUS stands today, but see nothing wrong with starting the challenges.
I’d also like to see the decision overturned. I consider myself conservative (but not a Republican) and don’t want corporations to have more political power. Corporations are inherently selfish, and do not (some might argue cannot) act altruistically.
I’d argue most conservatives also want entities like that to have less political power, not more. But then I also thought most conservatives would never support ICE, and I was wrong about that.
I’d go further, and say that we as a society shouldn’t allow inherently-selfish constructs to even exist in the first place. If we’re going to create such a thing as a corporation, we should create them in such a way that they can, or even must, be altruistic.
For-profit corporations exist for that purpose. There are thousands of not-for-profit corporations that often exist explicitly to consider other entities welfare.
Just a reminder, the OP has a very specific piece of legislation they’re looking at. General political discussions of what rights a corporation has, or should have is also a worthwhile topic, but one of you fine people should absolutely spin that off into a separate GD/P&E thread. Please remember to keep discussions of corporate rights to the specifics to Citizens United and/or the upcoming legislation cited in the OP when posting here.
I know it’ll be challenging to not get drawn into a general debate, but let’s respect the OP’s focus. Otherwise, see below:
How to Reply as a linked Topic
Click Reply, in the upper left corner of the reply window is the reply type button, looks like a curving arrow point to the right.
Choose Reply as linked topic and it starts a new thread. As an example, you can choose GD, IMHO or The Pit for it.
Which of course- can never happen. In these times of such harsh political rivalry, no constitutional amendment can be passed.
Other nations do have something like the Bill of Rights, but our is pretty unique.
I agree- I do not like the decision, but I can see how and why SCOTUS made it. It follows along with earlier decisions.
I can see a more liberal Court whittling away part of it (Let us hope), but absent an Amendment- which aint gonna happen- it is law. Hawaii will not change it.