SUPREME COURT REPORT

Fifth Edition
January 27, 2010

Catastrophe at the Court?
Where is Harriet Myers when we need her?

A 5-4 court decided Citizens United v. FEC by overturning part of the McCain-Feingold law. In November I wrote "This case, so far as I know, is about how overtly money can run and buy the country and its political agents." Led by Chief Justice Roberts, the court drastically expanded the free speech rights of corporations. Some commentators have told us that our basic mistake was passing a law over 100 years ago that made the corporation a legal person. Now, as a person under the law, the corporation's right to speak undoes the spending limits placed on it by existing, and now unconstitutional, law.

Business largely runs and controls the strings of power in the United States, as it is now. This grave extension of the financing right of corporations to directly support candidates increases what was already much too large for a good democracy, or republic.

The court ignored lengthy findings by Congress that money tends to corrupt the political process. According to one liberal pundit, it also ignored a hundred years of related decisions about campaign finance, including its own decision in a case not more than a few years old. Between then and now, O'Connor retired and Alito took her place. Where is Harriet Myers when we need her?

Often the results of court decisions are not just what was expected. We can only hope that will be the case here. It does appear that Congress' power to change this effect is quite limited.

As Daniel Shorr said on the radio today, "It is not a good time for Democrats."
It recalls some of the year-after-year feelings I had during the Bush administration.