Tag: McCain-Feingold

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First Amendment rights national politics & policies too much government

Congress Moves to Censor the Net?

The Internet is not safe. Congress wants to regulate it. The most recent idea is to sic the Federal Elections Commission on Net freedom.

Recent hearings on something called the DISCLOSE Act disclosed that the act would “extend the FEC’s control over broadcast communications to all ‘covered communications,’ including the blogosphere.” Or so say the Center for Competitive Politics’ Bradley Smith and Jeff Patch, writing on Reason.com.

It’s hard to imagine a worse idea. No groundswell of citizens demanded this. So of course Congress is considering it.

Would they really try to regulate the blogosphere?

The lead “reformers” in Congress say all they want to regulate are political ads on the Internet, not bloggers. But, as Smith and Patch note, the actual language of the current bill quite clearly leaves open the blogosphere for regulation. They also doubt the good intentions of the would-be regulators, explaining how, in the early days of McCain-Feingold advocacy, “the ‘good government’ crowd . . . denounced a deregulated Internet as a ‘loophole’ in campaign finance law, a ‘poison pill,’ ‘anti-reform’” etc.

How can respectable Americans advocate regulation of speech, as if the First Amendment did not exist? It’s as if they are baffled by plain language: “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging freedom of speech, or of the press. . . .”

How can they live with themselves?

For me, it’s a consolation to know that at least censors in Congress can still be thrown out, peacefully, with votes.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights national politics & policies

Stop Us Before We Kill Free Speech Again

The Supreme Court has yet another chance to refer to the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. And follow it.

The case before the court, Citizens United versus FEC, has to do with how federal campaign finance laws and the regulations issued by the Federal Election Commission are violating freedom of speech.

Citizens United is a conservative non-profit organization that produced a documentary critical of Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign last year. A D.C. court ruled that producing it with the help of corporate funding was a violation campaign finance law, specifically the McCain-Feingold Act.

Eight former FEC commissioners have now filed an amicus brief in the case. They argue that the lower court’s decision violates the First Amendment — you know, the part about not making any law to abridge freedom of speech. One of the former commissioners, Hans von Spakovsky, explains in the Wall Street Journal that it is virtually impossible to know under the convoluted regulations exactly when one is allowed to engage in political speech and when one must shut up. Why not just let everyone exercise his First Amendment rights?

Spakovsky concludes that friends of campaign finance restrictions on speech have “lost sight of a basic truth: The answer to speech they disagree with is not to restrict that speech, but to answer it with more speech.”

That’s just — and this is — Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights U.S. Constitution

See: Amendment, First

Will friends of freedom of speech catch a break this time?

Soon the U.S. Supreme Court will have another chance to rule that McCain-Feingold-style muzzling of political speech is heinously unconstitutional.

In September, before its regular new term begins, the high court will hear the case of Citizens United versus Federal Election Commission. This involves the standing of two rulings. One is a 1990 ruling banning corporate funding of political campaigns does not violate the First Amendment. A 2003 ruling upholds a ban on corporate speech that even utters the name of a political candidate.

Does the Constitution permit or prohibit stuffing gags in our mouths to prevent us from speaking out of turn? Supporters of Campaign Finance Repression like to say that they’re only regulating the spending of money, not speech. Of course, human beings lack the power to engage in mass long-range telepathy. The only speech that costs nothing is the kind you utter to somebody sitting next to you in the room. Would the regulators claim that limiting the money newspapers can spend on printing presses or websites leaves them with unencumbered “freedom of speech”?

The First Amendment is explicit. “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” You make a law abridging the means of speaking, and you are abridging freedom of speech.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.