Posted on 04/02/2014 9:51:37 AM PDT by jazusamo
Until this morning, the federal government could limit the amount of money you contribute for political speech. Today in McCutcheon vs. FEC, the Supreme Court invalidated overall contribution limits. The federal government limited individual campaign contributions to $48,000 overall and $123,200 to everything (PACs, candidates, national parties) each cycle.
The Supreme Court struck down the limits, holding that the government’s justification for limiting free speech rights – to keep money out of politics and the avoid the appearance of impropriety – failed.
This decision cuts at the heart of the leftist narrative on free speech attacks. The heart of the narrative on the left (and among a smattering of GOP Senators) is that money in politics is bad and that large financial contributions create the appearance of corruption.
The Court rejected these justifications squarely.
Significant First Amendment interests are implicated here. Contributing money to a candidate is an exercise of an individual’s right to participate in the electoral process through both political expression and political association. A restriction on how many candidates and committees an individual may support is hardly a “modest restraint” on those rights. The Government may no more restrict how many candidates or causes a donor may support than it may tell a newspaper how many candidates it may endorse.
One of the most interesting aspects of the case is the role of lawyer Dan Backer. Backer is the driving force behind the decision. He went out and sought plaintiffs who could help strike down this law. Backer represents an activist breed of conservative lawyer who borrows the tactics of offense from the left and seeks to alter the legal landscape and the future of the nation. He was featured in USA Today last month.
USA Today text deleted due to copyright request, click above.
In a profession dominated by the risk adverse, Backer’s tactic of eternal offense stands out. Today, he gets to bask in the glow of enormous success.
The left is already apoplectic about the decision today and are sending email blasts to conjure up a mob. From a Moveon.org email that just went out:
We can’t vote Supreme Court justices out of office—but we can definitely make sure that they—and the media and politicians watching—know the people’s opinion in this case. That’s why MoveOn members are showing up TODAY with other progressives and allies at more than a 150 Rapid Response Rallies nationwide in reaction to the Supreme Court’s flawed decision.
Can you join in at an event near Washington?
Well, that oughtta throw some cold water on the euphoria that the evil Marxist regime was feeling over their contrived little “victory lap” from yesterday!
McCain is very sad!
Liberals Have Accounted for 70% of ‘Dark Money’ Spent in Politics in 2013
Though Democrats have railed against the influence of money in politics after the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling, liberals have accounted for 70% of the so-called “dark money” that has been spent this year.
According to Open Secrets, “liberal dark money in 2013 makes up 70 percent of all the dark money spent so far. At this point in 2011, liberal money accounted for less than 6 percent of the dark money spent, and in 2009, the total was a little higher, at 6.5 percent.”
Open Secrets describes “dark money organizations” as “501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) nonprofits that don’t have to disclose their donors.” Democrats have tried unsuccessfully to pass the DISCLOSE Act, which would “require unions, nonprofits and corporate interest groups that spend $10,000 or more during an election cycle to disclose donors who give $10,000 or more.”
“Spending by liberal 501(c)(4) groups is already more than $1.7 million so far this cycle,” Open Secrets writes. “That’s an increase of nearly 6700 percent over the $25,458 spent by liberal dark money groups at this point in the 2012 cycle.”
“501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) nonprofits”
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Just another reason to replace the income tax with a national sales tax.
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