Intelligence, Please…

The more I think about it, the more I’m frustrated with the false choice with which the Left has presented America, regarding the recent SCOTUS reversal of campaign finance legislation. The false choice says that if you’re not with We the People, then you’re an evil conservative who supports the evil use of evil corporate money in our otherwise untarnished political process…how patriotic.

But is the issue here a matter of for-profit corporations writing checks for “unlimited sums” of money for politically conservative ad buys for Republican candidates, mucking up the system and drowning out the voices of the teeming masses? Well, I suppose you could argue that…in fact, Nashville-based progressive blogger Sean Braisted did just that:

If Conservatives want to claim that corporations are just groups of individuals getting together to speak, then we ought to know who those individuals speaking are.

Braisted – who I admittedly don’t know from Adam – was writing in response to a bill that Tennessee State Senator Andy Berke recently introduced to State Senate that would require disclosure by corporations of the monies they donate to political campaigns in Tennessee. Fine. The court struck down a federal law; use the state legislative process to settle the issue (until, of course, Tennessee’s as-yet-unheard-of version of Citizen’s United files suit over a similar issue).

So many populist progressives have ignored in their opposition to the high Court’s decision that labor unions also benefit from the decision. But who gets to give, when, and how much isn’t the fundamental issue here, nor is it an issue whether or not the Court has conferred de jure rights of the individual on incorporated entities; at issue is the Congressional action to generally limit political speech. Where progressives miss in their arguments is in confronting the Court with a frame that says “you’re either with the people, or you think that corporations should have rights of individuals.” But it’s not as simple as that. The last time I read the US Constitution, the First Amendment said:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In no part of this amendment did the Framers even attempt to make a distinction between individuals and incorporated entities…but the burden should not be upon proponents of the Court’s decision to argue that a corporation has or deserves a right to political speech; the burden should be on the Court’s detractors to argue that a corporation shouldn’t or doesn’t have these rights inherently. Huffing about, pointing fingers, and yelling “No fair!” isn’t going to get it done.

Perhaps the frustration comes from the Court’s 1976 landmark decision in Buckley v. Valeo, which held that contributions by individuals are forms of political speech, and since politicians are corrupt – not contributors – the government didn’t have a compelling reason to limit that political speech. If the Court made a distinction between individuals and corporations then, why are corporations all of a sudden exempted from restrictions? Isn’t this a clear-cut case of conservative judicial activism? I don’t think so, especially when you think about the practical outcomes of this decision (as opposed to the doomsday prophecies). Marc Ambinder over at The Atlantic has some great prospective analysis:

Politics co-exists with an anti-incumbent, anti-Washington environment. Corporations exist in an environment where anything Big is suspect, including name corporations. Consumer brands tend to fare better, but the companies that might be inclined to invest in a particular candidate are those with deep claws in the economy. Smart companies aren’t going to take risky bets…

Corporate boards are risk averse. Smart CEOs don’t want to risk internal conflict on boards when deciding which political candidates to back directly. there will be innumerable potential conflicts of interests; perhaps a board member for company X, which is regulated by Congressman Y, also sits on the board of company Z, which plans to run advertisements attacking Congressman Y for another reason. Down the line, one can envision three scenarios: corporate boards stay out of politics; corporate boardrooms become less ideological diverse; corporate boardrooms are riven by internal political disputes…

Brian Fung, a whiz-kid political thinker, suggests a tenth — a company faces ostracism by the winner if its chosen candidate loses and the corporation’s been firing both barrels during the campaign. For the most part, the corporations won’t support the hyper-partisan candidates on either side. They’re likely to support incumbents — or, if the incumbent has done something really objectionable, an opponent. My guess that is corporations would probably be more likely to run milquetoast ads in favor of incumbents to curry favor with them, rather than ads attacking candidates.

In a comment thread on another blog, Braisted made a good point:

[Before this ruling]…Every citizen had the same rights to political speech as every other citizen…this ruling simply expanded the bullhorn for those with the most.

Not to belabor the point, but unions may also now play in this political space – not just Exxon, Halliburton, and everyone else that the Left hates – so now pro-Republican corporations and pro-Democrat labor unions have the same rights to political speech; and let’s not also forget that technology giant Apple, Inc. parted ways with the typically pro-Republican U.S. Chamber of Commerce last fall over the Chamber’s opposition to cap-and-trade legislation. Does that make the use of large sums of corporate funds in a political campaign okay? Well, I don’t exactly know…but I’m waiting to hear a good case as to why not.

As far as I can tell, Hollywood production studios have been using large sums of money for leftist political speech for a long time. Where was the populist outcry during all those years? Is this really a populist outcry in the first place? Or is it merely the boiling point for a progressive movement/Democratic Party that has nothing to show for its leader’s first year in office, and faces dreadful poll numbers as we near the 2010 midterm elections this November? The only thing of which I can be sure at this point is that this issue is not a “with us/against us” issue, and I don’t appreciate the frame being thrust upon me. The Supreme Court can speak for itself – and I think it has.

But in the meantime, I reach back to Buckley to offer Sean Braisted, progressives, populists, and Sen. Andy Berke a compromise: since politicians – not corporations or individual contributors – are inherently corrupt, how about a bill requiring politicians to disclose every corporate contribution they accept, from whom, when, how much, and for what purpose it was spent? It could be flashy new section on campaign websites, and a huge win for transparency advocates and populists alike. If this issue really is a populist issue, and we are to distrust government at all turns, then this ought to be an acceptable compromise; so let’s hold the government’s feet to the fire.