Unpossible! That would be a clear violation of your first amendment rights!
Or, maybe not. Maybe, just maybe, there are reasonable constraints on rights that survive constitutional scrutiny. Could be.
No. It limits campaign contributions. This is an extremely narrow, and equally applied, limitation on one facet of speech.
It applies to every citizen equally, and it does not limit your ability to express your views at all. You are still free to go out and express yourself as much as you choose. That’s why it’s not a violation of the first amendment.
However, extending it as you suggest, WOULD be. For the reasons already specified.
So it’s a limit on speech.
If one limit can be constitutional, then other limits could be too. I don’t say they are, because no one can say if they are or not, because the question of what is constitutional is ultimately a political question, answered by partisan poltiical appointees, rather than a fact of nature.
As an example, courts have held at one time that corporations can’t spend unlimited money on electing candidates, and at other times other courts have held that they can. Given that, saying that no such restriction can be constitutional seems odd; it has been held so, and might well be held so again.
So you can’t dismiss an argument of that form by simply saying “that’s bullshit because of the constitution.” You might think that, but it is not the clear certainty you claim it to be, and statements like that’s just a nonsense throwaway line that disintegrates under the lightest scrutiny are just posturing.
(sigh)
No, not really. It’s a limit on campaign contributions.
It does not limit your speech at all.
You’re on thin ice.
The limits on corporate contributions were abolished in Citizens United. There remained limits on individual contributions ($2800), and aggregate contributions ($117000).
Until 2014, when the SCOTUS looked at aggregate contributions. And found that they violated the First Amendment.
Now all that’s left is the $2800 limit. If that’s where you want to hang your hat, given recent trends you might be disappointed.
One problem with money as speech is that we have no tools or will to keep track of who’s all the money is and where it comes from. So we are de-facto allowing every rich foreigner to have a larger “voice” in elections than our actual voting citizens. Are we so resigned to rich corrupt Americans controlling our politics that we slide into not caring that it is now rich corrupt oligarchs from everywhere using the US electorate as their psyops playground?
I’m a little confused as to why there should be no limits on corporate contributions, but limits on individual contributions.
I also don’t really see why no or tightly capped corporate contributions would be a bad thing or in any way restricting speech. No one has really been able to put forth an even faintly coherent argument. It appears the main thrust is that they want their lobby groups to be unrestricted therefore they are willing to let other lobby groups be unrestricted.
The unrestricted flow of corporate and interest group money into politics really does not seem to have improved things.
Technically there are limits on corporations donating to campaigns, just like for individuals
The problem arises from crap like superpacs. Because they aren’t technically donating to the campaigns. They are just don’t their OWN thing, which happens to be supporting the candidate. They aren’t giving money to the campaign to spend on ads, they are making their own ads.
Legally, they are supposed to be totally separate, and aren’t allowed to coordinate, but in practice they almost certainly do, because it’d be virtually impossible to prove.
But it’s this mechanism which essentially Shields them in the first amendment, because it’s no different than you going out on your own and expressing any other political viewpoint.
As is anyone making absolute statements about what is and isn’t constitutional. That’s my point.
SCOTUS in 2003 upheld the exact part of the statute they later voided in Citizen’s United. Apparently it was constitutional before it was unconstitutional. The only difference was the composition of the court. It’s a political judgement, subject to change.
Are there limits on how much a PAC can spend on the candidate or issue of their choice? Sure, individuals have limits when contributing to campaigns, but what about PACS.
Yes, PACs can spend no more than $5,000 in direct contributions to a candidate, and no more than $15,000 in contributions to a party. They can spend unlimited amounts of money themselves promoting a candidate or an issue as long as they don’t ‘coordinate’ with the candidate, which stricture is largely regarded as a farce.
The issue isn’t simply a difference between individuals and groups, but from the perspective of how that money is spent.
SuperPAC’s don’t generally function by giving money to the campaigns. They function by operating as separate entities, where they spend their OWN money to create campaign messaging. This is how it circumvents campaign finance laws, because they aren’t technically giving money to the campaigns. They are independent groups which are just expressing their own political views.
This is why they are so hard to regulate, because any attempt to prevent them from expressing themselves would ultimately apply to preventing you or any other group of citizens from expressing their political viewpoints.
That is what I meant. It is the PACS who are free to collect and spend at will as long as they do it independently of the candidate. They are the real danger.
I think at one point there were limits on individual contributions to PACs, but then those limits were either struck down or legislated away, I don’t recall which. But that would be an effective way to regulate this: establish a ‘total individual political contributions’ threshold which governs contributions to candidates / parties / PACs or similar entities. So if you give a max contribution to a candidate, you can’t turn around and donate to a PAC.
(Yes, you think that violates the Constitution, but other courts did not think so, that’s a recent view tied to the poltiical ideology of the current court)
Yeah, but they’re also basically just doing what YOU would do.
If you say that they can’t spend money to express a political view, then why are YOU allowed to spend money to express a political view?
Because they aren’t people, so don’t have free speech rights?
I think they should be limited like a campaign is. Face it, PACS might as well be extensions of the candidate/cause they support.
How are they not people? They are literally a group of people.
You don’t give up your rights by associating with a group. This is clearly established in multiple SCOTUS cases, and is pretty much rock solid legal precedent. That is not going to get overturned.
If you and I decide to work together and form an organization to further some political agenda (as is the case with literally every political movement), we do not suddenly lose our constitutional rights.
By what mechanism of constitutional law do I lose my rights to express myself simply by working with others to execute that expression?
From a practical perspective, they absolutely are.
But the problem that presents itself, is that there is no coherent argument for why it’s acceptable to limit your rights, simply by virtue of you collaborating with others, and that collaboration is essentially all a PAC is.
Why is it legal to limit your right to donate to a campaign and not legal to limit your right to donate to a PAC?
Because the limitation on your ability to donate to a campaign is not limiting your ability to express yourself. You are still free to spend other money to voice your viewpoints as much as you like.
However, to try and limit the ability to contribute to a political movement overall, is essentially a broad limitation on your ability to express yourself. To see the problems, you merely need to start considering how it ultimately would apply to other choices you might have to express yourself.
For example, certainly I cannot be limited in my ability to go out and speak my mind. But what if I print a hundred pamphlets? What if I print a MILLION pamphlets? What if I choose to spend my own money to buy an ad on TV? What if you and I work together to do some of those things? At what point does it cross some line and become “Bad”?
The problematic aspect with such limitations, and why they are currently held as unconstitutional, is because there is no clearly articulated reason why some of it can be banned, without banning all of it… and since banning all of it is clearly unconstitutional, it ended up all being viewed as unconstitutional.