Protesters: Real citizens’ names don’t end in Inc

[irishbobcat]

Protesters: Real citizens' names don't end in 'Inc.'
By David DeWitt

Calling it the worst ruling of a generation, a group of citizens gathered outside the Athens County Courthouse on Friday afternoon to protest the Citizens United vs. FEC U.S. Supreme Court decision.
The ruling held that corporate and labor union funding of independent political messages in candidate elections cannot be limited under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

The effort was part of a national movement called "Move to Amend" that seeks to overturn the year-old ruling with a constitutional amendment. The Citizens United decision passed with a 5-4 vote from the justices.

Headlined, "Move to Amend advocates confirming constitutional rights for human beings as a vital step toward genuine self-governance," literature from the campaign distributed at the rally states: "We propose constitutional amendments to abolish corporate constitutional rights handed down by appointed-for-life Supreme Court judges."

The group states that it wants to "abolish corporate personhood and confirm inalienable constitutional and human rights for human beings."

The rally in Athens was organized by Ohio University senior Tyler Barton, who said that the event was not part of a coordinated national campaign but did fall on the one-year anniversary of the decision. Other events were held throughout the country, he said, but they were not coordinated.

He said.

The group hung fliers and used social media such as Facebook to spread word of the event, which had a turnout of around 40 people.

"The problem is that (the ruling) is intended to subvert democracy," Barton said. "Now it's the case that no government – federal, state or municipal – has the right to democratically regulate corporate spending in elections because they are, apparently, legally considered people and therefore have all the constitutional rights of people."

He said that corporations have their own special interests, pointing to companies in Arizona that he said essentially wrote what he called the racist immigration bill in Arizona that became law.

"They clearly have interests that are not in line with (the good of the people)," he said.

Campaign contributions, Barton said, can influence politicians to a large degree when they go to vote on legislation. He cited the decision itself, saying that it's been called into question whether some of the Supreme Court Justices themselves had conflicts of interest in deciding the case.

He also pointed to the Affordable Care Act health-reform legislation that he said evolved from ideas for a single-payer system to what was passed and amounts to big corporate giveaways to insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

"I think that there needs to be an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that says that corporations are not people," he said. "We don't need to regulate corporations in the Constitution, but we do need to enable the people through democracy to regulate as they see fit."

The Move to Amend has several goals as a grassroots movement. Literature from the event states the intention to guarantee the right to vote and participate in democracy exclusively to individual citizens, "without fear of our voices, our votes and our participation being silenced by corporate interference in our elections."

It says the goal is to protect the rights of local communities to govern themselves "so that democratically enacted laws are not overturned to suit wealthy and powerful corporate interests."

The decision originally came about as the result of a dispute over whether the non-profit corporation Citizens United could air a film critical of Hillary Clinton, and whether the group could advertise the film in broadcast ads featuring Clinton's image, in apparent violation of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, commonly known as the McCain–Feingold Act.

The Supreme Court struck down a provision of the McCain–Feingold Act that prohibited all corporations, both for-profit and not-for-profit, and unions from broadcasting "electioneering communications." An "electioneering communication" was defined in McCain–Feingold as a broadcast, cable or satellite communication that mentioned a candidate within 60 days of a general election or thirty days of a primary.

Several pieces of federal legislation have been introduced in both the U.S. House and the Senate to narrow the interpretation of the decision and create limits and hurdles for business corporations that contribute money to support or oppose political candidates and their campaigns.

These proposals include prohibiting contributions from foreign companies; ensuring corporate compliance with the Federal Election Campaign Act; preventing for-profit corporations that receive government funds from making political contributions; taxing corporate contributions; and requiring publicly traded companies to disclose in Securities and Exchange Commission filings money used for the purpose of influencing public opinion.

The Move to Amend group states that, although they support many of these initiatives, the legislative solutions are too modest and "safe," and none of them address the core problem, which they say is the illegitimate legal doctrine that courts use to allow corporations to overturn democratically enacted laws.

"The problem goes far beyond money in elections," the group states. "Corporations have hijacked our government and use the legal system to legitimize their rule. Our response as a self-governing people should be equally serious."

Supporters of the high court's decision in Citizens United, including Washington Post columnist George Will, say limiting independent corporate and labor union campaign contributions amounts to unconstitutional censorship, as well as encouraging government to get more involved in political speech.

In a column a year ago, Will argued, "Last week's Supreme Court decision that substantially deregulates political speech has provoked an edifying torrent of hyperbole. Critics' dismay reveals their conviction: Speech about the elections that determine the government's composition is not a constitutional right but a mere privilege that exists at the sufferance of government."

Will agreed with the Supreme Court majority's position that since the dissemination of political speech requires money, "so restricting money restricts speech."