RES 263 Draft 01 2010-2012 - Laserfiche WebLink

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WHEREAS, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) erroneously equated the desire of large corporations to influence political decision-making through massive electoral expenditures with the speech of individuals and groups seeking to make their voices heard; and WHEREAS, contrary to the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) majority's assumption that disclosure would allow for public accountability, half of the drastically increased spending during the 2010 elections was by political committees not required to disclose their donors; and WHEREAS, the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) four dissenting justices observed that, "Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their 'personhood' often serves as a useful legal fiction. But they are not themselves members of'We the People' by whom and for whom our Constitution was established;" and WHEREAS, the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) dissenters correctly observed that money spent on behalf of candidates is a means of amplifying speech and not a form of political speech itself, and restrictions on corporate spending are more properly viewed as restrictions on the time, place and manner of speech; and WHEREAS, in his dissenting opinion in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010), Justice John Paul Stevens observed that "At bottom, the Court's opinion is...a rejection of the common sense of the American people, who have recognized a need to prevent corporations from undermining self government since the founding, and who have fought against the distinctive corrupting potential of corporate electioneering since the days of Theodore Roosevelt....While American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this Court would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in politics;" and WHEREAS, spending in the 2012 elections is projected to total at least $8 billion, and spending by "Super PACs" has played a dominant and deleterious role in shaping the presidential election thus far; and WHEREAS, In 1816, former President Thomas Jefferson wrote, "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;" and WHEREAS, In his 1910 "New Nationalism" speech, former President Theodore Roosevelt stated that, "It is necessary that laws should be passed to prohibit the use of corporate funds directly or indirectly for political purposes; it is still more necessary that such laws should be thoroughly enforced. Corporate expenditures for political purposes...have supplied one of the principal sources of corruption in our political affairs;" and WHEREAS, Article V of the United States Constitution empowers and obligates the people and states of the United States of America to use the constitutional amendment process to 2