CT Progressive

So the text of Dodd and Udall’s post-Citizen’s United Constitutional amendment:

Section 1. Congress shall have power to regulate the raising and spending of money with respect to Federal elections, including through setting limits on—

(1) the amount of contributions to candidates for nomination for election to, or for election to, Federal office; and

(2) the amount of expenditures that may be made by, in support of, or in opposition to such candidates.

Section 2. A State shall have power to regulate the raising and spending of money with respect to State elections, including through setting limits on—

(1) the amount of contributions to candidates for nomination for election to, or for election to, State office; and

(2) the amount of expenditures that may be made by, in support of, or in opposition to such candidates.

Section 3. Congress shall have power to implement and enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

It seems like… less than the occasion calls for, to be honest. For example, if my company wanted to spend half-a-million dollars on each of a dozen candidates for office, what would stop me from filing 100 subsidiaries and giving the legal maximum (2 x $2400) that applies to individuals?

That the proposed amendment doesn’t touch corporations directly is understandable, as broad-based corporate personhood amendment might be a bigger lift than Congress can achieve at this point in time, and a narrower version of that which restricts corporate participation in elections could be read to concede the validity of the corporate personhood concept in every other facet of the law. One quote in the Register piece gets at this:

Quinnipiac Law School professor William Dunlap said Dodd’s proposal is a “straightforward way” of addressing the financing of elections without getting into corporate speech and First Amendment issues.

But he was not sure if it meets the senator’s goal of overruling Citizens United, as the power to regulate election spending is only part of the problem.

“Even if Congress has the power to regulate in a particular area, it still may not do so in violation of some other constitutional provision,” Dunlap said.

“As I read the Citizens United case … it is premised on protecting freedom of speech, not on an absence of congressional authority to regulate elections. A court intent on keeping Congress from regulating in the way it has been may be able to rely on the First Amendment to do so,” Dunlap said.

I wonder if an amendment could be tailored to define the contours of a right to participate in the electoral process, but restrict that right to individuals or citizens.

The more I think about it, a serious hurdle in restricting corporate involvement in elections is the question of how you draw a line that prevents corporations from spending while protecting the existence of PACs. A comprehensive approach that asserts the rights of individuals could very well ban PACs, which is fine with me but might lose it a lot of Congressional support.

Anyway, it’s a real puzzle, and while it’s not the perfect Pony Plan for banning corporate involvement, I do appreciate that Dodd got something out on the table so this conversation can begin in earnest.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 25th, 2010 at 11:59 am and is filed under National Policy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.