Comments on: Paternalism and Campaign Finance Law

By: m65

m65 — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 00:43:20 +0000

good read thanks for the share. i really like the way the article is written and also the design of the website

By: Citizens United and Corporations as the Super Duper « Trevor Burrus

Citizens United and Corporations as the Super Duper « Trevor Burrus — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 18:50:52 +0000

[...] is an element of paternalism to both sides, but as Julian Sanchez of the Cato Institute skillfully points out, the left has a distrust of the shotgun-style broadcast ads that may influence those who are not [...]

By: Links and Quotes « Modeled Behavior

Links and Quotes « Modeled Behavior — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 03:08:24 +0000

[...] post on the Supreme Court decision (see Karl’s take below). The best so far on this issue are Julian Sanchez and Eugene Volokh. Julian writes: Why is it that so many people who clearly do think books and [...]

By: DivisionByZero

DivisionByZero — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 12:55:50 +0000

““Equating money with speech” has never struck me as a particularly fair summary of the argument. The idea is not that “money is speech” per se; it’s that regulation can BURDEN speech even if, in theory, it only targets expenditures.”

I see. That would explain the monotonous repetition of the word “chilling” in the decision. If we step away from first principles (which in my opinion justify this decision regardless of the whole personhood debate) and consider conditionals, then I don’t see this supposed “chilling” effect to be significant enough to take the risk of compromising the electoral system. Notice I said risk. I’m not saying it will happen but there is the possibility and while the possibility may be low the results would be catastrophic. Thus from a risk-benefit perspective it’s simply not worth it.

By: RickRussellTX

RickRussellTX — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 05:12:25 +0000

@sam

“Does anybody really believe that the corporate leadership is going to poll the shareholders re any political advertising it seeks to engage in?”

Isn’t this exactly the… for want of a better word… paternalism Julian is decrying?

Presumably, if the interaction of my political views and my stock portfolio are important to me, I should make some effort to follow the news about the companies I invest in. If I choose to give my money to somebody else and let them handle the details, then I implicitly do not have such concerns.

Corporations do all sorts of stuff on my behalf (as a tiny minority owner), and I’m free to dump my ownership on the secondary market in a heartbeat if I disagree with them.

By: Julian Sanchez

Julian Sanchez — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 03:49:48 +0000

“Equating money with speech” has never struck me as a particularly fair summary of the argument. The idea is not that “money is speech” per se; it’s that regulation can BURDEN speech even if, in theory, it only targets expenditures. In other words, the government doesn’t get to cheat on the First Amendment and say: “Well, we can’t make it illegal to criticize the drug laws, but we can make it illegal to SPEND MONEY on criticizing the drug laws.” It’s the same reason a law banning yarmulkes or headscarves would (under normal circumstances) run afoul of the free exercise clause, even if the words “Judaism” and “Islam” didn’t appear in the legislation.

By: DivisionByZero

DivisionByZero — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 00:26:15 +0000

Btw, re: your first point: CU made this argument. Re: your second point I believe the reason that broadcasting “indecent” content is that it is more persuasive and would persuade more people to act indecently. In the case of political advertising it may be that broadcast mediums were considered too potent and needed some kind of restraint. Whatever the case I have more of a problem with equating spending money with speech. How then can the government forbid us from buying anything?

By: DivisionByZero

DivisionByZero — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 23:50:03 +0000

Sorry, I haven’t read Buckley v. Valeo. I should have before commenting.

By: Julian Sanchez

Julian Sanchez — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 21:59:11 +0000

I was not under the impression that the special nature of broadcast played a significant role in the justification here, but it would make very little sense if it did. First, the CU case involved cable on demand programming, which looks an awful lot like unicast to me. Second, the “pervasiveness” rationale might make some sense in the context of “indecent” content presumed to be offensive to many viewers; it makes no sense in the context of political advertising. Not that I’m a huge fan of the Court’s broadcast indecency jurisprudence, but even if we accept it all wholesale, I don’t think it provides any support for the regulation at issue here.

By: DivisionByZero

DivisionByZero — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 18:22:24 +0000

Julian, you said it yourself. Both radio and television are broadcasts. That’s why the government gets to censor them for naughty language and images. You can find much more explicit material via unicast means (e.g. books, magazines, and the internet). I’m not sure what the issue is here.