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10-11-06
Citizens United v Federal Election Commission
, 130 S.Ct. 876 (2010) – alandmark decision in ushering in a Robber Baron Revival Era.
Conditions now prevailing at the US courts are deemed central to the ushering in of a Robber Baron Revival Era.Such conditions are contrasted with conditions in the Supreme Court of the United States a century ago, andlandmark contributions of Justices like Benjamin Cardozo and his colleagues in “piercing of corporate veils”,which are credited with bringing the original Robber Baron Era to its close.Attached:1)
Chemerinsky, E: Conservatives embrace judicial activism in campaign finance ruling,
Los AngelesTime
s, Jan 22, 2010;
2)
Citizens United v Federal Election Commission,
Wikipedia
(downloaded on November 6, 2010).
Digitally signedby Joseph Zernik DN: cn=Joseph
Zernik, o, ou,email=jz12345@earthlink.net, c=USDate: 2010.11.0706:05:39 +02'00'
Conservatives embrace judicial activism in campaignfinance ruling
The Supreme Court's decision in favor of corporate spending in elections makes previousrhetoric laughable.
January 22, 2010|By Erwin Chemerinsky
The Supreme Court's 5-4 decision holding that corporations and unions can spend unlimitedamounts of money in election campaigns is a stunning example of judicial activism by its fivemost conservative justices. In striking down a federal statute and explicitly overturning priordecisions, the court has changed the nature of elections in the United States. At the sametime, the conservative justices have demonstrated that decades of conservative criticism of judicial activism was nonsense. Conservative justices are happy to be activists when it servestheir ideological agenda.
Since Richard Nixon ran for president in 1968, a central feature of Republican and conservativerhetoric has been to attack judicial activism. The phrase is never defined with any precision and hasoften been used to refer to decisions that conservatives simply don't like. But if judicial activism hasany meaning, it surely refers to decisions that overturn laws and overrule precedents. In contrast, judicial restraint occurs when courts defer to the other branches of government and follow precedents.By this definition, judicial activism can be good or bad. Brown vs. Board of Education was activist inthat it declared unconstitutional laws in many states requiring the segregation of the races ineducation. To do so, the justices overruled a 58-year-old precedent upholding such laws. But virtuallyall agree today that Brown was one of the greatest moments in Supreme Court history.To conservatives, though, the phrase "judicial activism" has come to mean any decision with a liberaloutcome. President George W. Bush declared: "The judges ought not to take the place of thelegislative branch of government. . . . I don't believe in liberal activist judges. I believe in strictconstructionists." The 2008 Republican platform declared that "[j]udicial activism is a grave threat tothe rule of law because unaccountable federal judges are usurping democracy, ignoring theConstitution and its separation of powers, and imposing their personal opinions upon the public."The court's campaign finance decision makes this conservative rhetoric laughable. The ruling, whichgrew out of a conservative nonprofit corporation's attempt to air an anti-Hillary Rodham Clintondocumentary during the 2008 primary, throws out a key component of the McCain-FeingoldBipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002. Among other things, the law banned corporations frompaying to broadcast "electioneering communications" for or against candidates in the final weeks of presidential primaries and general elections.
McCain-Feingold was a continuation of statutes that have existed since 1906 limiting corporatespending in federal election campaigns. The act was intended to prevent the enormous wealth of corporations from distorting elections and protect corporate shareholders from having their moneyused for purposes with which they disagree.For years, conservatives have argued that judicial restraint requires deferring to the choices of theelected branches of government. No such deference was evident when the court's five mostconservative justices struck down this provision of the McCain-Feingold law on Thursday.Nor did the decision defer to judicial precedent. In 2003, in McConnell vs. Federal ElectionCommission, the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision upheld this same law. In fact, in an earlier case in1990, the court said that legislatures may restrict corporate spending in election campaigns. Thecourt's decision on Thursday expressly overruled these decisions.What changed over the last eight years? In the 2003 decision, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor joinedwith John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer to make up themajority. O'Connor's replacement, Samuel A. Alito Jr. voted the other way and joined withconservatives John G. Roberts Jr., Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas todeclare the same law unconstitutional.For decades, conservatives have argued that judicial restraint requires that courts protect rights only if they are stated in the text of the Constitution or were clearly intended by the document's framers. This,for example, is the core of the conservative attack on Roe vs. Wade. But there is not the slightest shredof evidence that the framers of the 1st Amendment meant to protect the rights of corporations to spendmoney in election campaigns. The conservatives were glad to abandon the "original meaning" when itserved their purposes.The conservative majority, which in recent years has dramatically limited free speech in other areas --such as for government employees and for students -- was willing to expand the free speech of corporations. There is no way to see this other than as the conservative justices using judicial reviewto advance the traditional conservative ideological agenda.Almost 10 years ago, in Bush vs. Gore, the five conservative justices for the first time decided apresidential election. One would have thought that decision would have laid to rest the notion that judicial activism is a tool of liberal judges and revealed that the real judicial activism today is from theright. Perhaps Thursday's decision will finally reveal the truth.Erwin Chemerinsky is dean of the UC Irvine School of Law.
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10-01-21 Citizens United v Federal Election Commission 130 S.Ct. 876 (2010) at the Supreme Court of the United States - opinion of Prof Chemerinsky and Wikipedia overview-s
Conditions now prevailing at the US courts are deemed central to the ushering in of a Robber Baron Revival Era. Such conditions are contrasted with conditions in the Supreme Court of the United States a century…
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