Justices Overturn Key Campaign Limits - NYTimes.com. WASHINGTON — Sweeping aside a century-old understanding and overruling two important precedents, a bitterly divided Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections.

Well, so much for recognizing that people are all created equal. Corporations are created more equal.

“I believe in the division of labor. You send us to Congress;we pass laws under which you make money…and out of your profits, you further contributeto our campaign funds to send us back againto pass more laws to enable you to make more money.”**

– Senator Boies Penrose (R-Pa.), 1896, citing the relationship between his politics and big business.

Is corporate free speech more important than the good of ordinary people? Evidently our Supreme Court considers that it is.

Recall how the benefits of corporate stock are distributed:

Top 1%own 38.3% of the stocksNext 19% own 52.8% of the stocksBottom 80%own 8.9% of the stocks and

51.9% of usowned no stocks in 200717.5% of us owned stocks worth less than $10,000 in total31.6% of us owned stocks worth more than $10,000 in total

[source: Edward Wolff, 2009]

And then consider the distribution of business equity: privately held businesses [“BUS”]:

Top 1% hold62.7% of the value Next 4% hold25.5% of the value(top 5% = 88.1%)Next 5% hold5.5% of the value(top 10% = 93.7%)Next 40% hold15.5% of the value(top 50% = 99.6%) [source: SCF, 2007] and then the aggregate of the SCF categories STOCKS, Non-Money Market Mutual Funds [NMMF], Retirement Assets [RETQLIQ] and BUS, which together represent 50.3% of aggregate household wealth: top 1% hold 45.9% of the value next 4% hold 27.6% of the value (top 5% = 73.5%)next 5% hold 9.6% of the value (top 10% = 83.1%)next 40% hold 15.5% of the value (top 50% = 98.7%)

[Source: 2007 SCF, reported here]

83.1% of 50.3% is 41.8% of America’s aggregate net worth … in the hands of 10% of us in the form of businesses and stock. (It omits their holdings of a number of other categories – which are not insignificant. The top 10% of us hold 71.5% of aggregate net worth; the other 30% they hold is in their real estate and other assets. For instance, guess whose beaches get renourished by the federal government? Guess whose bridges and airports get lots of federal dollars, even if the locality refuses to tax its own land value – California being the prime example, but NYC isn’t far behind.) And they have now been declared free to spend that money on influencing elections right up to the last minute, with no time for ordinary folks to collect funds to rebut their assertions. Some free speech, huh?

Thank you, Supreme Court. Thank you, Justice Kennedy. Thank you Justice Roberts. Thank you Justice Scalia. Thank you, Justice Thomas. Thank you, Justice Alito. I suppose they all believe that the founders of our country would have approved of this. Could the founders have imagined this distribution of wealth, given the ideals on which this country was founded?

Guess whose freedom of speech the Supreme Court has guaranteed? Those who have the dollars. Guess who gets to write our rules, and in whose favor they will be written.

Post Script: There are more comments to this article than I’ve seen in a long time on a NYT article. A few I particularly liked:

  • Money gives you freedom of speech. Oh and by the way, we the people don’t have any.
  • Do corporations also have the right to bear arms?
  • Thank you SCOTUS for finally giving a voice to the beleaguered and powerless corporations of these United States. I look forward to an enlightened age of political discourse that this decision will certainly usher in.

  • Corporations having more rights than citizens and determining government policy with the influence their money buys - isn’t this fascism???

  • This is a terrific, well-thought out decision permitting corporations and unions to spend on political campaigns. It’s a good news day if you own a radio or television station

  • Corporations are global entities. We now have non-citizens on unaccountable boards paying for YOUR representative. Totally illogical.

  • We’re not a democracy. It’s a terrible misunderstanding and a slander to the idea of democracy to call us that. In reality, we’re a plutocracy: a government by the wealthy." : Ramsey Clark, former U.S. Attorney General

    “Of all forms of tyranny the least attractive and the most vulgar is the tyranny of mere wealth, the tyranny of plutocracy” : John Pierpont Morgan

    “I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.” : Thomas Jefferson

  • So…are there any Americans still under the romantic notion that we live in a Democratic Republic? Just wondering.

  • When enough voices can’t afford to be heard over high priced noise, those voices will resort to violence because action speaks louder (and costs less) than words.

  • Buying a product or service should not have to be a political act - now it always will be.

    From now on, when I buy a product or service, I will have to research the company’s political agenda, otherwise risk having my own money spent by them for their own political benefit. Buying aspirin shouldn’t translate to a political endorsement.

    Also dig this perversion of the language - an “association of citizens”? What blatent double speak. A corporation is not an individual. Free speech applies to individuals. If individuals who coincidently work for the same “association of citizens” want to exercise their individual right to free speech, go for it. Businesses and their money should be banned from funding politics in any way. We’ve just done ourselves and our descendents a grave disservice.

  • The “conservative” wing of the court? I don’t think so. The radical right wing, no question, but there’s nothing the least bit conservative about Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, and Alito. They are hyperactivist judges, taking every opportunity to overturn any law that interferes with a corporation’s ability to oppress and exploit ordinary Americans.

  • Did you appreciate the work of the Swift Boaters? Now you will see it times a hundred or more.

  • The decision to spend money on political ads is not made by members of the organization. It is made by a few executives. Even shareholders, the owners, have no voice. This decision puts the resources of the organization to work achieving the goals of a handful of executives. How is that free speech?

  • Now all they need to do is recognize bribery as a form of political speech and we’re on track to end this pernicious thing called democracy.

  • This is just one more reason to keep Obama in office for another four years…. We simply can’t trust the Republicans and their agenda. Indeed, it is Bush’s appointments to the Supreme Court that made this horribly narrow-minded and dangerously foolish decision today.

  • This decision can be analyzed as a part of global multinational corporations to dredge, drill, rape and pillage every last bit of resources from the planet without interference from any governments anywhere. It is eveident by now that we are running out of everything, and they want to profit exclusively to the max without hinderence on what is left. Sort of like vultures, but definitely not a part of natural balance. It is sad that so many are brainwashed by corp. media that they do not see the true enemy. No wonder so many of the left and conservative citizens who do see are totally disgusted. How much worse will it get? Our current leader seems to be beholden to the same interests as his predeccesor, just a different face, etc. With empty messages like “change” and “hope”, to woo the desperate and gullible public.

  • It seems like the Supreme Court is determined that we should always have a Republican president. They handed the white house to W way back when. And that worked out so well that now they’ve decided to hand all elections over to corporate interests–the same folks that brought you our current economy. Can we impeach the Supreme Court? If so, how?

  • The beginning of the end of democracy in America. Imagine what Exxon, Monsanto, Merck, Morgan Stanley, Blackwater, Lockheed, Halliburton, etc., will do? Imagine what the lemmings that take their marching orders from the FOX News spinmeisters will do?!

  • Since when are speech and money the same thing, deserving of equal or even parallel protections?

  • When I reflect on what do all human beings have in common, all ‘individuals’, I think of our suffering. We all share the capacity to suffer. Corporations do not share this. I’ve never heard a corporation cry out in pain or wail in agony. And yet, a corporation has the power to create and propagate astounding levels of suffering. Examples of this abound. Insurance companies that deny care (to my ailing mother) come immediately to mind. The hard fact is, over time, this ruling will cause our suffering to increase exponentially.

  • Corporation were always free to SAY anything they want. Money is another issue - it equals POWER, not SPEECH. And when used as campaign donations, it’s just a bribe.

  • …by the corporation, for the corporation. Do any of these idiots get it? We are not working…construction is at a standstill. A revolution is coming when we can’t feed our families. No bailout for us, they just stick it to us along with their crappy public health plan–yeah once again, tax the middle man instead of the rich 5%–this country sucks!

  • The idea that a corporation can take on the moral and civic responsibility of a ‘person" is metaphysically beyond comprehension…sans conscience, rationality, moral integrity, capacity to weight the good of the whole versus the good of the few stock holders…are we holding a democracy here or not.

  • In their confirmation hearings, the Bush appointees said they would respect precedent. They lied. They said they would not legislate from the bench. They lied.

  • On IRS forms I do not think giving 1$ for election funds is worth the trouble. No candidate will ever try to claim that money, when they can get millions from corporations.