Citizens United Decision in Citizens Research Paper

Moreover, it was set to air during the 30 day time period prior to the primary. Finally, funding for the documentary was obtained, in part, from contributions from corporations. As a result, it clearly violated BCRA §203. However, they argue is that, regardless of the source of the speech, political speech is of such critical value to the population that it should always be protected (2010). Moreover, while the documentary in question was produced by the right-wing of the political spectrum, they point out that BCRA § 203 had also limited speech on the left. Because corporations and unions are, essentially, groups of individual citizens, they believe the decision ultimately protected the individual right to free speech.

However, criticisms of the decision seem to reflect the reality of the American public and political campaigns far more than praise of the decision. The average American voter is woefully uninformed and easily persuaded by advertising. Therefore, campaign finance plays a critical role in modern elections. The candidate with the most money may not always win, but will be able to exercise a tremendous amount of influence and gain a much greater percentage of the voters than would have been possible without significant spending. Up until this point in time, there was a natural limit on that spending, as campaign contributions were limited to individuals. Now that unions and corporations can directly donate to campaigns, those natural limitations have been removed.

Fred Wertheimer's concern that "the decision will unleash unprecedented amounts of corporate 'influence seeking' money on our elections and create unprecedented opportunities for corporate 'influence-buying' corruption" may have seemed alarmist when he wrote it in 2010, but the last Presidential election and the tremendous amount of corporate money that went into that election demonstrated exactly that phenomenon (2010).People may wonder why corporate or union money would be a bad thing in an election. Succinctly put, corporations are not people and their boards do not represent all of the political interests of their shareholders. The legal duty of a for-profit corporation's board of directors is to increase profit for that corporation; their sole purpose is to make money. As a result, corporations very frequently advocate for laws that are counter to the interests of the general public. Up until this time, campaign finance laws that prevented corporate and union donations theoretically made it possible for the individual citizen's voice to be heard in an election. The Citizens United decision virtually ensures that the voice of the individual will be drowned out in future elections. In protecting speech for corporations, the Supreme Court has rendered political speech by individuals to be basically useless. Therefore, in holding to the letter of the Constitution, they have eviscerated its intent.

References

Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 588 U.S. 310 (2010).

McConnell, Mitch and Abrams, Floyd. Pro & con: Is the Supreme Court's ruling on campaigns bad for democracy? No: Free speech, no matter the speaker, is what our Constitution protects. The Atlanta Journal Constitution. http://www.ajc.com/news/news/opinion/pro-con-is-the-supreme-courts-ruling-on-campaigns-/nQb5y / (accessed December 5, 2012).

Wertheimer, Fred. 2010. Pro & con: Is the Supreme Court's ruling on campaigns bad for democracy? Yes: turning clock back 100 years, decision will corrupt government. The Atlanta Journal….....