Water is not wet ....says US Supreme Court.

[matmar]

....but the Montana State Supreme Court begs to differ...

The Montana Supreme Court has put itself on a collision course with the U.S. Supreme Court by upholding a century-old state law that bans corporate spending in state and local political campaigns.

The law, which was passed by Montana voters in 1912 to combat Gilded Age corporate control over much of Montana's government, states that a "corporation may not make ... an expenditure in connection with a candidate or a political party that supports or opposes a candidate or a political party." In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court, in its landmark Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision, struck down a similar federal statute, holding that independent electoral spending by corporations "do not give rise to corruption or the appearance of corruption" that such laws were enacted to combat.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/04/citizens-united-montana-supreme-court-corporate-spending_n_1182168.html

These fascist assholes on the SCOTUS need to be replaced by people with common sense like Chief Justice Mike McGrath

on edit:

dissenting state Justice Beth Baker wrote that Montana "made no more compelling a case than that painstakingly presented in the 90-page dissenting opinion of Justice [John Paul] Stevens and emphatically rejected by the majority in Citizens United."

Justice James Nelson, also dissenting, wrote that it "would not surprise me in the least" if the U.S. Supreme Court reversed his court's decision without even asking for briefs or oral argument from the opposing parties.

To reverse the Montana Supreme Court, however, the justices would have to extract themselves from a quandary of their own making, noted professor Rick Hasen of the University of California-Irvine Law School on his popular Election Law Blog. "If the Court were being honest in Citizens United," Hasen wrote, "it would have said something like: We don't care whether or not independent spending can or cannot corrupt; the First Amendment trumps this risk of corruption."

But by "dress[ing] up its value judgment ... as a factual statement," continued Hasen, the U.S. Supreme Court must now explain why the Montana Supreme Court was not correct to consider the factual record when it came to justifying corporate spending limits in campaign finance laws.

.......in other words, yelling "fire" in a crowded theater (when there is no fire) is a right of free speech and will not give rise to the idea that people will stampede for the exits.....this is essentially what these clowns on the SCOTUS are saying.

[Gman]

1. Dissenting Justice Nelson makes a good point

Why even bother putting on a case? The 5 already know how they'll rule.

[matmar]

5. Because of this paragraph...

But by "dress up its value judgment ... as a factual statement," continued Hasen, the U.S. Supreme Court must now explain why the Montana Supreme Court was not correct to consider the factual record when it came to justifying corporate spending limits in campaign finance laws.

.....the reason for the laws that were enacted to prevent corporate money from corrupting our government was because of the historical record of corporate money corrupting our government.

Go fugure.

[joshcryer]

2. I don't think Citizens United forbids a law from being tailored that...

...targets only for-profit corporations, it only says that corporations as a whole cannot be suppressed, as the FEC was doing administratively (not legislatively).

DISCLOSE Act is an example (though weak, because it doesn't prohibit for-profit corporations speech), which was introduced by Democrats, but was voted down.

Citizens United can mean that a new law can be tailored that goes after for-profit corporations, at the bare minimum if such a law was made the Supreme Court would have to rehear the case on the grounds that corporations are not people.

[florida08]

3. Thank you Montana

SCOTUS are oligarchs. Montana is also the state trying to remove it's senators for signing the NDDA. They have set the precedent.
More will get on board.

https://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/01/04-0

[Scuba]

4. +1