(Host) Two years ago this month, a bitterly divided Supreme Court
overruled precedent and held that the government may not ban political
spending by corporations, and that the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of
2002 violated corporations’ right to free speech. Here’s commentator
and Vermont Humanities Council executive director Peter Gilbert to
explain.
(Gilbert) For the five justices in the majority, the
Citizens United decision upholds the fundamental free speech notion that
government may not regulate political speech. The four dissenters fear
that unlimited political expenditures by corporations will "drown out
the voices" of everyday Americans.
The decision is based on the
majority’s conclusion that [quote] "independent expenditures, including
those made by corporations, do not give rise to corruption or the
appearance of corruption… And the appearance of [mere] influence or
access will not cause the electorate to lose faith in this democracy."
[unquote] Certainly that was a debatable proposition two years ago, and
it is even more so now, in the time of the Tea Party and the Occupy
movement.
The fact that the Constitution has long defined a
corporation as a person needn’t mean that corporations have the same
free speech rights as human beings. After all, corporations are
different from humans. While humans speak out of different motives,
including self-interest, altruism, and disinterest, corporations speak
for just one, albeit quite legitimate, reason: economic self-interest.
How much their right to speak should be protected should be determined
with that in mind.
Moreover, corporate speech is less closely
related to three key reasons why the Constitution protects free speech
in the first place: One reason is a free society’s commitment to the
search for truth. But query whether corporations and unions spending
money in elections without any restrictions will help or harm the search
for truth.
Second, free speech is protected because it’s vital
to democracy. But again, query whether absolutely unlimited speech from
legal entities of virtually limitless wealth helps or hinders democracy,
including ordinary citizens’ ability to make up their minds freely and
to be heard themselves in the public debate.
And third, free
speech is protected because we consider it an integral part of being a
free and independent human being. But protecting the autonomy and
integrity of human beings doesn’t apply to corporations at all.
Accusing
the majority of judicial activism, Justice Stevens argues in dissent
that the majority’s assertion that the First Amendment doesn’t permit
distinctions based on the identity of the speaker sounds compelling, but
in fact the government places speech restrictions on numerous groups,
including students, prisoners, and members of the Armed Forces; and he
points out that for more than a century Congress has limited
corporations’ campaign spending.
Stevens concludes, "While
American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this Court
would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in
politics."
Perhaps the most infamous Court decision in American
history is Dred Scott, handed down in 1857. Citizens United is, in a
sense, the converse of Dred Scott. Dred Scott defined a class of human
beings (slaves) as property, thus depriving them of any legal rights;
Citizens United defined a class of property (corporations) as persons,
and grants them the right to speak as such. Time will tell whether the
consequences of Citizens United will prove as catastrophic as Dred
Scott.