On the one hand it’s much ado about nothing. Those who wish to use their money to frame the debate have ample ability to do so before and after this decision.
On the other hand the court went “activist” and made their decision far broader than it needed to be to address the issues raised by the case before it. This, it seems to me, is graver cause for concern. Not what was done but the process by which the court did it.
Had a court done the same thing with a result benefitting liberal sensibilities the outcry would be sky-high.

Technology makes it so that if the feds control the campaign bank accounts in federal elections(as they do now), full, complete and immediate disclosure of donors’ identities could be a reality. That would make much more sense than the current mess. Want to take $1 million from Satan, Inc, okay, but everyone will know tommorrow. The PAC nonsense was no better, and it all was violative of the 1st Amendment.

Want to take $1 million from Satan, Inc, okay, but everyone will know tommorrow.
See, I’m not so sure everyone will know. Everyone whose paying attention maybe, but the average voter doesn’t pay *that* close attention. We’ve seen in the past how easily swayed the electorate is *as a group* — individuals each have their own areas of interest in which they are more informed — to massive onslaughts of single issue messaging. (Usually negative messaging.)
The other thing that worries me is that even if everyone is well aware of who is funding advertising and takes that into account, I still think there is going to be a big up-tick in inaccurate and misleading information. I worry that the independent voices of reason who try to truth-squad claims will simply be overwhelmed and underfunded and we will be left not knowing what we can believe. The situation is BAD now in this regard, but that’s no reason to justify making it worse.
Finally, this is only about free speech if corporations and unions are citizens/people under the law. If they are considered such under U.S. law (I’ve heard it argued both ways) then my opinion is that they should not be. There can be laws to protect the entrepreneurial spirit that don’t rise to that level.
I believe that this ruling is extremely corrosive to our system of government. It will *increase* corruption, *increase* cynicism, and *decrease* confidence in they system. We are stumbling as it is, and this is a blow to a kneecap.

Urg — forgive the typos above. Edit feature anyone??

To me it is pernicious to equate money with free speech. Freedom of speech means that ideas are not to be suppressed, not that whoever has the most bucks gets to drown out the rest.
I>everyone except for a government fund that would be equally distributed to all parties on the ticket (rules for how you get on the ticket, as opposed to being a crank claiming to “run” for office are a separate issue, and most states have them already). Allow no ads until 30 days before the election (or 90, if you insist), and reinstate something like the Fainess Doctrine, but applicable only to election years and candidates in races in those years. Everybody plays by the same rules, and if they don’t like it, they deal with it.
That’s never going to happen here, but that would be much better, in my opinion, than the corrupt mess we have now.

Hmm–the first part of the second paragraph should have read, “The Supreme Court would never accept it, but the best system would be a European-style one where all money was banned from everyone….”
This software is impeding my freedom of speech!

What does “all parties” mean? Problem with the “fairness doctrine” is you would be making political parties part of the framework, and there’s no constitutional basis for that. In fact what little we know about the Constitutional Conventional on the issue is that what ever their differences in the Jefferson-Madison/Hamilton camps, no founders wanted to give political parties a role, and in fact many like Washington thought parties were evil. And then what parties would be “fair”?Who gets included, who gets excluded, who makes those decisions.

NaturalMom has hit the nail on the head. Corporations do not have the rights of citizens except as they are allowed by law. Individuals cannot compete against corporations for a number of reasons, but two stand out. First, individuals can have a presence in one place at one time; corporations can be almost everywhere all the time.
Second and most importantly, individuals are careful about where they spend their money; corporations spend other people’s (shareholder’s) money. We complain mightly about government spending taxpayer’s money without thought to our wishes, but we ignore corporations who do exactly the same thing. Want to give free enterprise a shot in the arm? Restrict corporate spending to just the costs of production and require all profits to be distributed to shareholders. Keep corporations focused on their two main functions: providing goods and services to their customers and making profits for the shareholders. If corporate managers want to spend THEIR money for THEIR political agendas, fine. Do presume to spend shareholders’ money for agendas that shareholders might not share. It’s funny how you don’t hear complaints about the billions upon billions of corporate dollars spent on political agendas, yet you hear inveighing against the much, much smaller contributions of unions contrary to the wishes of their memberships.

However much McCain-Feingold may violate the rights of individuals, it does not violate the rights of corporations, for the simple reason that corporations have no rights to violate. Corporations are gollums of the state and the state can place whatever restrictions they want on them. If you don’t like the restrictions, don’t incorporate. The only good thing about this decision is that it may outrage enough people to where we may finally start getting corporations back under control (but I’m not holding my breath, either).

When is a return to what is guaranteed in the Constitution “activist”?
It is clear that those who have offered opinions here have not read anything about the case and what was argued.
If it was just allowing corporations to do what the labor unions are free to do it would be a victory for freedom and the Constitution.
What was allowed under the overturned law was that the government could ban a book if it deemed it political, if it was being released too close to an election, even if it just mentioned a candidate in a passage indicating support of that candidate.
I don’t like to equate free speech with money, but if I want to publish a book, release a movie, or even take out an ad close to an election, I should be allowed to do so, as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States when it comes to free speech.
If the only ones who can speak close to an election are the members of the MSM then where is the freedom that we are guaranteed?
Those who actually read the decision and read the testimony that prompted the decision would understand that it about guaranteeing us our rights, nothing more and nothing less. It was a good decision for all Americans.

To a great extent, corporations get to hide from individual responsiblity for the decisions behind the legal protections of their corporate identity. This, and their money, give them an unfair advantage over the average citizen. Perhaps we need to stop treating a corporation as a person. Then, individuals in the corporation will still have their free speech rights but the corporation will no longer have free speech rights.
I’m not sure equating money with speech is good. Not a lawyer, unlike my brother. But, I’m certain that this decision will give corporate America another unfair advantage over you and me. And that is wrong, and there must be a way to rectify it, even if McCain-Feingold was the wrong instrument for achieving that goal.

A prostitute by any other name would smell no less rank.
Why not simply run campaigns and for that matter elections on eBay if it’s all about the highest (corporate) bidder? First Blush Starter Set: Wanta guess how much money Exxon & Halliburton would put on a Sarah Palin run for anything national?

I believe that, up until now, campaign money was restricted to citizens (even with a PAC).
With this Supreme Court ruling, any entity, no matter how composed or governed, can spend to influence a campaign. A sovereign wealth fund, for example. China could try and get “free trade” politicians elected.

I’m not keen on the ruling for two reasons.
The first is I get the distinct impression that if the composition of the court were slightly different, the outcome would have been completely different. Basically Supreme Court’s rulings are based on the ideological bias of the members, and not the arguments, so justice is ultimately arbitrary.
Second, equating corporations with humans strikes me as dangerous. Corporations can be sociopathic entities because of the pursuit of profit coupled with unbridled competition. There seems to be an inexhaustible supply of shady people willing to run them. With all that money and power they’ve done a lot of damage lately. Before the libertarians flame me, consider all the business scandals of the past decade. Also consider that corporations in China are exporting food tainted with anti-freeze and melamine.

Rod,
This whole thing is about Corporate Personhood, to which Naturalmom, JLF and Larry have alluded.
Complete BS, in my opinion. Corporations never have to die (when was the last time a charter was revoked); can’t put a corporation in jail…
This blog seems like it would be interested in the giving of the rights of person to an entity with no soul.
I would love it if you would read Hartmann’s “Unequal Protection” and do a post.

My opinion is that the Citizens United decision was absolutely correct. (Full disclosure: I’ve dealt with state and federal campaign finance laws for 25 years.) The decision was a long-overdue reaffirmation of the First Amendment. And for those of you who are concerned about the influence of nefarious “evil” for-profit corporations, remember that decision frees ALL corporations to make independent expenditures, including those “progressive” non-profits set up by the likes of George Soros. Any corporate entity, regardless of where it falls on the political spectrum, has had its free speech rights upheld by this opinion. What the opinion did do was recognize that part of the speech-regulation scheme administered by the odious Federal Elections Commission (and also some state agencies) is an unconstitutional infringement of everyone’s rights.

How can you trust profits over what’s good for America. These are the same corporations who ship American jobs to India and China in pursuit of profit. Also, Foreign companies with American branches will now have a huge say in persuding the American public.
This is a disaster.

The singe biggest mistake ever ‘allowed’ in America was recognizing a corporation as the equivalent of a a person.
Rod, if you truly are as “divided” as you say you are, you are simply (and demonstrably) NOT on the side of the little guy – the individual citizen.
Any citizen does and should hve the right to spend as much of their own money exercizing their ‘free speech rights’ (aka saying any damn fool thing or lie that pops into their empty heads), but cororations with huge, deep pockets that can (and WILL – just you watch) outspend individual citizens will be the demise of actual free speech – speech (in the form of paid advertising) will simply be out of the reach of the average ordinary citizen.
O how the might have fallen.
P.S. The second biggest mistake is having passed laws that make it perfectly legal to falsify the news.

The unintended consequences of this decision have yet to unveil themselves.
The clear winners are the media companies from whom advertising will be purchased.

Well, for better or worse, the ruling unleashes corporate money. Or as Huffington Post put it in a headline, Court Rules Corporations Don’t Have Enough Say over Government. But I’m not convinced the outcome will be what people imagine. When it comes to nuance, I think corporations that want to influence politics are going to fall flat on their faces with independent voters. Remember during the 2008 campaign when audience reaction needles moved to the disapproval rating when a candidate went negative in a televised debate?
I don’t think the people who will be crafting corporate advertising have a clue as to how to reach people like that. They’re wired for a chicken little approach and broadsides, not for thoughtful arguments. They’ll unleash ads with the scared sounding female narrator breathlessly described a looming Armageddon – and people like me will just laugh at the “ack, be scared” approach and mute the sound or change the channel. That chicken little, sky is falling approach just isn’t going to be effective with everyone, although it does reach some people. The ad makers will fall into the same traps that political advertisers have fallen into in recent years. For them, it’ll always be a black and white world, gray doesn’t exist in such ads. But the real world has a lot of grays. I say, let ‘em shut themselves in the foot, they’re not savvy enough to avoid that. And the people who yearn for black and white chicken little arguments have them so trapped, they couldn’t escape that approach even if they understood the need to do so. They’ll be stuck with fear mongering, I predict.

GrumpyOldPerson,
Really, the “singe biggest mistake ever ‘allowed’ in America was recognizing a corporation as the equivalent of a a person?” Good luck ever having a functioning economy without that. People with half a brain would be incredibly risk averse in an economy that did not afford the protections that corporate law allows. If plaintiffs could pierce the corporate veil at will, and go after the personal assets of stockholders/partners/etc, our economy and judicial system would be an absolute mess.
On another note, does anyone else find it ironic that during the March for Life week a completely fictional person (a corporation) is afforded the same rights as a real person, whereas real persons (babies) are still not afforded all the protections of real people?

In my comment about how corporate political advertising has the potential to repel voters like me and turn us away from supporting the causes being pitched, that should read “shoot them in the foot.”

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It is not the governments right to limit speech. The previous law limited speech. Let freedom have its way.

I think it is good that restrictions on nonprofit groups like the NRA and the Sierra Club are removed.
I don’t like it that restrictions on regular corporations are removed. Worse it is likely that USA corporations that are owned by foreigners will be allowed to spend money in US political campaigns.
When I hear conservatives and republicans happy that regular corporations have the same political rights as flesh and blood citizens I think they are vindicating left wing arguments that mainstream conservatism is an ideological servant of big business.

The basic fallacy on which this new decision was made is that a corporation is a single entity that creates its own speech. It is by definition a body of people (the “corp” in corporation). As an organization, it has no single voice, so the protection is not valid. If the CEO, CFO, Sales Rep or even custodian wants to say something – THAT is protected. But they should not be allowed to use CORPorate funds to do that. Also, they should be easily identified and not hidden behind some mask of euphemisms.
Essentially this new ruling has unleashed a beast that will not be contained or restrained. Now whoever has the most money can overwhelm the airwaves and blanket a community with its own opinion. This is not democracy in any form. It is unbridle economy with a huge appetite that cannot be appeased.
The Supreme Court has pulled an “NBC” on this one.

My comments on this ruling are at http://distributism.blogspot.com/2010/01/welcome-to-plutocracy.html

David Frum gives his take, arguing that a different type of reform is needed (h/t to Sullivan at The Daily Dish):
“As Peter Wallison argues in his great book on party finance, the real evil of American politics is that politicians must beg interest groups for the money to finance their campaigns. What we need is not “less money” and CERTAINLY not less speech – but more distance between donor and recipient. The mechanism for that is the political party. Reformers should be focusing on lifting limits on the flow of money from parties to candidates and restoring the role of the parties as the funders of campaigns. Instead of Candidate Smith asking Donor Gonzalez for money – and Donor Gonzalez asking for a favor in return – party chairman Robinson will ask thousands of donors for money on behalf of a slate of candidates, who will never know precisely whose gift was directed to them. That step will diminish corruption and the appearance of corruption.
The outlawing of speech by corporate groups on the other hand only diminishes liberty.”

A landmark Supreme Court decision — and you can take that to the bank.
Of course, now you’ll have to ….
See:
http://notionscapital.wordpress.com/2010/01/21/freedom-of-speech-2010/

All thoughIbelieve in check and balance. I think only reason why this is an issue right now is the fact that corp. America dose not like the current administration. So the President and the Democratic party are all scared with the up and comming mid term elections.
Knowing that financing will be the difference between more or less airtime to get thier issues out. That the Republican party will Benefit more so because not only are Voters taking head of whats going on. The Democrats need all the air time they can get to lie about how thier for the people and the Republicans are not. At this point in the game with all the Republican Wins Corp. Financing would only be iceing on the cake for Republicans. And the Democrats and the Pressident know this. This is why It is o important for the current administation to try to stop , block , hinder or in real terms “Oboma it” Definition {Hope & Change}. So right now Democrats are Hoping they can change the law in thier Favore. Because if it was not for the current losses for the Democratic party this wouldnot be an issue.

I will be very interested to see what happens as foreign corporations get involved in our elections. I don’t think we can predict at all what they will want to promote.
One blog I read said it was ironic that a bunch of conservative justices should make a move towards single world government.
What amazes me is that the tea partiers are not more dismayed. But then, I read quite a few comments to the effect that ‘liberals don’t like it, so it must be good’.

BEN GINSBERG
Partner at Patton Boggs; national counsel to the Bush-Cheney presidential campaign, 2000 and 2004
“The voices of candidates and political parties just got much quieter. While robust First Amendment debate is the big winner from Citizens United, the current limits on contributions to candidates and parties create an imbalance that must be fixed.
The 35-year effort to limit contributions to candidates and parties has now resulted in a system about to be utterly dominated by special interests ranging from corporations to unions to ideological nonprofits. The solution that would allow candidates to control their own messages and agenda, in light of the court’s bright constitutional ruling, is to increase the amount of money available to candidates.
Radical thinking, but necessary to get the system back in balance. So that candidates can spend their time campaigning and talking policy instead of fundraising, let the parties raise much more money to fund the campaigns.”
ROBERT LENHARD
Of counsel at Covington and Burling; chairman of the Federal Election Commission, 2007:
“The balance of power in political contests has shifted dramatically away from candidates running for office and toward corporations and unions seeking to advance their policy agendas. Candidates are now far more vulnerable to unexpected negative-ad campaigns, funded by corporations and unions either directly or through nonprofit groups.
Campaigns, corporations and unions can all now spend as much as they want on campaign ads. But campaign finance laws dramatically limit how much candidates (though not corporations or unions) can raise and from whom. . . .
Citizens United allows corporations and unions to spend unlimited sums attacking or supporting candidates. So picture this: An interest group makes a single phone call to raise $250,000 for attack ads in the waning days of a campaign. The candidate must find more than 100 willing donors, able to give the maximum permissible $2,400 contribution, to answer those ads with an equivalent buy.”
Indy, Of No Party or Clique: All of this means we’ll have to look for more sunshine. We need more and harder hitting books such as the good account Elizabeth Drew wrote in the 1990s about the role of money, how dispiriting it is to those who have to raise it constantly. She gave a sympathetic account of then Sen. Fred Thompson and his efforts to reform campaign during the 1990s. We’ll need more accounts like that, more light, more sunshine. As to ads, as I said, special interest groups largely will blow it. It’s impossible to make ads that will appeal to moderates and to the most extreme party loyalists on either side. The former look for solutions and bipartisanship and nuance, the latter don’t understand the appeal of that because they don’t respect people who hold differing views than they do. The corporations will pitch to the latter audience and ignore the centrists, thereby throwing away opportunities to catch their attention. Can’t you tell from the existing ads that going negative is valued more than going positive? Those who demand the negative have the ad makers by the throat. They’ll end up having to speak to the echo chamber, not persuading the affiliated.

I meant to write persuading the unaffiliated, of course

The case showed that CJ Roberts’ posturing as an apostle of judicial restraint at his confirmation hearings was an act, and those who thought it was an act at the time were correct in opposing him on that ground.
Now, it would be nice for directors to have to approve all contributions from corporate assets to political causes and to account for such approvals to shareholders (even require shareholder approval for contributions over a certain thresshold); that would not trouble the Constitution one iota.

There should be no rules on campaign finance except one: full, complete, timely disclosure of all contributions, listed by amount and source, and posted on the internet for all to see.
We spend less on elections in this country than we spend on pet food. A robust democracy would spend far more than we are allowed to.
Yes, the rich will have more power and influence. What else is new? They always have and always will have more power and influence. But when they overreach, they are usually smacked down. Obama took down the Clinton machine with all its power and wealth, partially by refusing to accept government campaign funds, and thus not having to submit to campaign spending limits.
Only someone willfully blind would say that restricting money in politics is not restricting speech. Why did Obama refuse campaign funding limits? It restricted his ability to get his message out. The MSM hates this ruling because they want to be the only ones who can speak freely. They hate it as much as incumbent politicians do, because it reduces their power and influence.
Every campaign finance rule ever passed was designed to make it harder for challengers to defeat incumbents. They were all designed to maintain and increase the power of the “reform” (really machine) politicians who advocated them.
To hell with the MSM and the politicians in power. Let everyone be involved and give them as much speech as they want to buy.

I think the decision stinks – 1) a 5-4 split doesn’t give one confidence that this is really a return to constitutional purity 2) it is activist but then again the court has been activist for a long time 3) foreign corporations and multinationals with those very very deep pockets – this now creates the possibility of such corporations having an inordinate ability to influence American elections – how can anyone think that is such a nifty idea? 4) the corporation as person – which is a notion being attacked with increasing frequency – to equate individual citizens rights with corporate rights is so dangerous that it boggles the mind that one needs to explain why it is dangerous 5) tips the balance of power to influence elections and policy even further in the favor of the wealthy
What gets me is the same conservatives who argue for limited government applaud runaway corporate power – the Founding Fathers are spinning in their graves

Crystal Knight @ 11:33 AM writes:
“Lord K, could it be possible for you to explain how and why corporations are considered “persons” under the 14th amendment and therefore have first amendment rights?”
I’m on it—but a full explanation will have to wait just a bit.
But basically, there were a series of Supreme Court cases that allowed corporations to assume personhood status under the then-new 14th Amendment. The first of these cases was handed down in 1887 or thereabouts, if I recall properly.
More later. All right ?
Your servant,
Lord Karth
[Note from Rod: Karth (and everybody else), please don't respond to "Crystal Knight." She/he is a troll whose stuff is unpublished as soon as I see it. -- RD]

I agree with the decision. The McCain- Fiengold law put all non-incumbents at a disadvantage. Basically, incumbents already have fund raising mechanisms in place.
It’s virtually impossible for a non- incumbent to secure countless small donations and rather easy for incumbents.
That’s why incumbents drafted the legislation.

I think this ruling is wonderful.
One effect of this ruling that the media has not figured out is that it is the first step towards ending FDA tyranny over medical freedom.

There is considerable discussion of this ruling on the Volokh Conspiracy:
http://volokh.com/

I think there is a bropader issue being overlooked – perhaps because not everyone is familar with all the details. What concerns me the most is how political this decision is – partisan in fact. The Court scheduled the hearing on this before their normal session begins – why? Sure looks like they did it so that the new ruling would apply to upcoming congressional elections. The case brought to the court had nothign to do with the issue of prohibiting corporations from doing this – it was a case about the Fed Election Commissions right to prohibit political ads (the “Willie Horton” guy – knowing the Horton ads would be banned – made a Willie Horton movie and put ads for the movie on during the prohibited period – the FEC said he was violating the law). The courst agreed the FEC was right to ban the tricky Horton ads – but then went on to rule on the issue of corporations and political ads – an issue that was not part of the lawsuit. The ruling overturns 100 years of Court rulings and law. It looks so partisan – and that cannot be a happy development from the Court.

It’s ironic that on the 37th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court again reiterated that corporations are people in the eyes of the law, hence they deserve free speech rights.
So there you have it: Babies are not people, but corporations are people. Good thing we have these black-robed dispensers of wisdom to enlighten us on these matters.

@Cecelia, the court could have ruled for the film maker narrowly – the prudent thing to do if they were going to find in favor — but chose to do it broadly. That’s the big giveaway on what is going on, not the ruling in favor of the film maker.
@LancelotLamar: I disagree that we need to spend more money on campaigns. Read Elizabeth Drew’s The Corruption of American Politics: What Went Wrong and Why. It focuses on Fred Thompson’s failed efforts at campaign finance reform in the 1990s. My takeaway from the book was that a lot of legislators hate, hate, hate the degrading and never-ending process of begging for money for their campaigns. Some actually drop out of public life because of it. I’d rather see a very short, limited period of campaigning (as in the UK) with much less money spent on campaign ads and more televised debates where people can watch the candidates in action.
Remember all those ads in 2008 with the ominous sounding music and the scared sounding female announcer telling us what awful things were going to happen if we didn’t vote Republican? I felt sorry for McCain every time they aired. Terrible tactical move by his ad people in a year when anybody could tell it a unity, “let’s get this country moving again” campaign (to quote JFK) would prevail over a fear mongering campaign. It’s because of that type of misjudgments that I think corporate political ads will fail, too. In fact, I know someone who voted for McCain in 2008 who kept asking me in disbelief, “is anyone influenced by those ads? I can’t believe anyone pays attention to them or reacts positively to them.” Remember, this SCOTUS decision is the result of a group making a Hillary bashing movie. When all you’ve got is bashing, it’s only going to reach the small, already committed audience who lap up that sort of thing. Sure, this decision means we’re likely to see more of that sort of thing. But moderates are going to roll their eyes and turn the other way, whether it’s right-wingers or leftists doing the screeching.
As for journalists, here again I disagree with you on their perspective. Unlike you, I don’t see them as stakeholders in the court decision. I actually wish Rod would post a non-partisan posting about the myth of the so-called Mainstream Media. That’s a term which arose during George Bush’s term, as I recall. I don’t know who coined it but I imagine it was someone who was frustrated that some message or other wasn’t getting across to the American people and cast around for something to blame. Anything is better than actually examining the message or the messenger, of course. (You only can do that in a learning environment where people are committed to the old fashioned concept of improvement.) That there are media filters just sounds like an excuse to me. If anything, the SCOTUS decision gives trad journalists more targets, as they can dig into the groups that fund the ads. Here’s hoping for some good stories. The more sunshine, the better.

Let’s be honest. This is not about corporate free speech. It is really about the ability of executives and board members of corporations to use corporate money to advocate for a political point of view. The guy driving in the motor pool is not going to have any say in the corporate speech. As such, it allows these already wealthy individuals to use corporate money in addition to their own, to influence our politics. This is an incredible decrease in liberty. However, once you understand this, the SCOTUS made the right decision. These people have the right to use that money. You really cannot, or at least should not, abridge speech.
OTOH, the corporate structure shields executives and shareholders from much liability. In the past, I have viewed the limits on speech as a fair trade off for those protections. However, if they are going to be able to use that money for politics, I think they should lose some of those protections. “I win, you lose” has become the corporate mantra.
Just to be clear, unions and non-profits do not come close to the amount of money controlled by corporations. Compare Goldman’s one quarter profits of $5 billion with the $85 million yearly budget of the ACLU or $250 million of Green Peace. Corporations are not evil. Corporations ARE rent seekers. Avoiding competition and rigging the rules in their favor is the easiest way to profits. See Enron.
Steve

I haven’t been following the thread closely, but about corporate personhood: Lord Karth is right in that case law going back some time has indeed established that corporations are, legally, persons, with all the rights and privileges thereunto attendant under the U. S. Constitution and laws. This is what I think the problem is. Taken severally, the employees, board members, shareholders, etc., of a corporation are people and have rights accordingly. For a corporation to exercise such rights, to me (as apparently to some others here) is a bad analogy.
Since, though, it is established in case law, my ideal, if I had one political wish, would be to rewrite the Constitution in order to eliminate the personhood status of corporations.
There has been an extensive discussion of this same issue over at Megan McArdle’s blog at The Atlantic’s website (I am largely in disagreement with her libertarian take on it). Over here is a take with which I heartily agree.

Good editorial cartoon about the little guy v. the big guy after the ruling:
http://davies.lohudblogs.com/files/2010/01/0122davies.jpg
Steve, you makes some good points. Let’s wait and see what legislators do.

Rod, you are right when you observe that the money seems to get through no matter what, but I think you are wrong to assume this decision means more power in the hands of the “wealthy”.
A multi-billion dollar corporation has more options than a mom and pop business when campaign contributions are restricted. They can hire lawyers to look for loopholes, set up organizations to run “independent” expenditures, etc. They are the folks whose money will always get through. What laws like McCain-Feingold do is restrict the little guys who can’t hire lawyers or set up independent entities. In that respect, while this may lead to more money in the political arena, I think it will also lead to that money coming from a wider set of sources, which is a net plus.

Emotions and opinions based on those emotions seem to be overflowing in all the comments here.
It seems that no one knows why corporations are treated as persons. It was not always that way.
It allowed for corporations to be taxed.
What was overturned was what denied the corporations something that most Americans are familiar with as being repugnant, taxation without representation. While corporations may not be able to vote, they should be able to promote being represented by those who would agree with them, no differently than we do when we cast our vote.
Most here sound like Obama who said in today’s weekly address about the ruling this week that the decision “…handed a huge victory to the special interests and their lobbyists – and a powerful blow to our efforts to rein in corporate influence.”
Yet somehow unions are not special interests and they don’t have lobbyists? George Soros is not some kind of special interest and doesn’t have lobbyists?
For Obama anyone who disagrees with him is an evil special interest, so too it seems for most who have replied to this thread so far.
I fully agree with what CB wrote above.
I might add that I don’t see corporations as evil, I don’t see unions as something other than another special interest. Why should they not have the same rights of expression.

Evan, perhaps unintentionally, you just proved my point about corporate ad makers’ projected inability to reach moderates. If they try your approach, which speaks to a narrow, selectively targeted audience — people already sympathetic to them for — I suspect their efforts at advocacy will fall flat. Not all of us are ideologues, some of us are persuadable but politically focused people overlook that.

People have already hashed out a lot of the issues here.
In theory, it’s a fine decision. Makes perfect sense if you consider the law and the Constitution and only that.
In practice, it’s a disaster. Massive sellout that’s not just going to diminish the power of parties (whose hands are still tied to a large extent). It’s also a massive invitation to foreign companies (especially those controlled by foreign governments) to get involved in our political process and to carry a larger voice in our political discourse than 99% of Americans.
In other words, the Supreme Court is living in an ivory tower.

“It seems that no one knows why corporations are treated as persons. It was not always that way.
It allowed for corporations to be taxed.”
Wrong. Some for profit corporations, those that are S-Corp or LLC, pay no income tax. Corporations are created to allow owners limited liability.

The ruling is what it is and it is based on the Constitution. I am, for my part, very much concerned about the potential for influence by foreign controlled corporations. Say, for instance, the Chinese government decides they want to influence our elections. they set up a corporation, and further incorporate subsidiary corporations in all fifty states. They can then pump funds from their government coffers into these fictional “persons”, and indirectly into American campaigns, and then after their candidate wins, demand that the newly minted official write up new trade agreements and legal protections that favor Chinese ideological policies like nationalizing all US banks, for example, or declaring that we must pay them for every time we “slander” their human rights records, or writing law forcing us to remove ourselves from the Korean peninsula and Japan, with the threat of using this constitutionally sanctioned corporate speech to unseat any official who doesn’t do so.
All of the sudden, China is not just funding us, they de facto control the US government. We become nothing but vassals of a foreign power. The same thing with any other nation or group that can get the funds going. Imagine if an ideological Saudi came to power and wanted to see Sharia law introduced in the US. He uses his nation’s petrodollars to set up corporations, and repeats the process.
On the plus side, there are only a handful of nations rich enough to do this. On the down side, it could easily destabilize us, creating confusion when one nation or another decides that we should be their pawns.
And as to the idea that these marketers will fail because they will use poor tactics – there are too many savvy marketers who could be “nudged” or lured into a job with huge benefits in order to write and generate highly effective advertising campaigns in support of their candidate without any oversight, and slandering all opponents so close to the election that there would be no way to stop the ad campaign and clear their name before the public.

Evan, you’re missing a most important point here: corporations exist to make money for their shareholders, not to promote the political agenda of their management. To the extent that management spends money on politics, they rob from their shareholders who do not share that agenda or consent to the taking.
Funny how so many can see this wrong when considering the theft of union dues in the same effort but fail to recognize it in corporations. Just another example of the mote and beam Jesus was talking about, I suppose

“I am, for my part, very much concerned about the potential for influence by foreign controlled corporations”
Saudi Arabia already owns a big chunk of Fox.
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/01/22/saudi-murdoch/
Steve

Indy,
If people all think, as it seems so many readers of this site seem to think, that all corporations are evil you may have a point.
However, remember Hillary care was defeated by skillful advertising by corporations. So perhaps a rethink of some of your conclusions would be in order.
Mercer,
You are wrong.
Corporations existed before there were any income taxes in this country. But you would have to know some history of the income tax and the supreme court rulings by an earlier activist court that made for profit corporations pay income taxes. You may also want to read the decision that required corporations owned by non profit organizations to pay taxes that they originally thought were exempt (hint look at the decision against the Roman Catholic Church and the ladies underwear factory that it owned).
JLF
I didn’t miss the point. What was it that allowed corporations themselves to be taxed? What Supreme Court decision stated that they were “persons”?
If I don’t agree with the position of a company I am not obliged to buy its stock. If I agree with the position of the company why would I not support their efforts to remain profitable? Not that I think that anything goes either. I might not agree with the “green” position but that won’t stop me from buying stock in a company who may make a fortune by being a “green” product supplier. I buy stocks to make money, not for any other reason.

Evan, I don’t think you’ve been following my posts closely. I never said all corporations are evil. I have implied that the political world often comes across to me as reductionist, even sometimes as juvenile. My major point is that it won’t be effective for corporations to use the same approach with moderate voters as most makers of political commercials use nowadays. I think the negative ads that political ad largely produce must be aimed at what they imagine are “low information” voters. I actually think that is kind of insulting to voters (why assume being scared is the only way to push their buttons?)
It’s the lack of respect for the American people and the over reliance on negativity that I find most pernicious in political advertising. The bar for political advertising is set so low, corporations are unlikely to be able to raise it. Interesting that you mention healthcare as I can point to what you probably won’t find, whichever side of the issue you are on — context – and what you will find – fear mongering. Here’s what I mean by context. People who follow health care reform issues know that what has been proposed over the last year is much more conservative than what Richard Nixon proposed in 1971. Nixon’s much more progressive and far reaching plan had an employer mandate, with employers required to offer every full time employee a comprehensive health insurance plan. And temporary federal subsidies to help out employers who needed that. That from a Republican president. And no one panicked back then.
Why people didn’t panic when Nixon introduced his plan in 1971 but are expected to panic now is an interesting question but I don’t have time to work through why. Except to say that as bad as the 1960s were, and if you’ve read Rick Perlstein’s Nixonland, you know that although those were tough times for both political parties, people had differing values back then. After all, it was the World War II generation that were the adults back then. Much has changed since then. That being the case, isn’t it more likely that we’ll get more of the ominous music and scared sounding female announcers proclaiming the end of America as we know it? With, depending on the issues, big doses of foreign money thrown it? In what way is that supposed to get people like me, the independents (solution-oriented, pragmatic, who want Americans to roll up their sleeves and to work to solve big problems) to pay attention or buy in to the arguments? It can’t. So that approach is — FAIL.

The significance of this has very little to do with the ability of “for profit” corporations to influence elections in my opinion. Most companies are too busy trying to make money to worry over the details of who is in office unless they feel threatened.
The big deal here is that nearly all “issues advocacy” groups are incorporated, and thus were subject to these rules. I see this as a win for “the little guy” because most of us couldn’t personally finance the sort of ads that affect the outcome of elections. But by pooling our resources together with other like minded people we had a voice. At least we did BEFORE McCain-Finegold took effect and silenced that voice.

“Mercer,
You are wrong.
Corporations existed before there were any income taxes in this country.”
The concept of corporations as persons also existed before the income tax. Which contradicts your earlier comment that:
“It seems that no one knows why corporations are treated as persons. It was not always that way.
It allowed for corporations to be taxed.”
Since corporation were considered person in the law before the income tax then a statement that they are now treated as persons so they can be taxed is wrong.

This ruling was consistent with a century and a half of bad precedent. Only a constitutional amendment can fix this. A corporation is not a person. Period. Only natural born persons have constitutional rights. Incorporation is a privilege which the sovereign people may grant if it promotes the general welfare.
I’m not, incidentally, opposed to the principle of limited liability. But these artificial creations have no right to fund campaigns, or to any participation in elections. They are creatures of government, and need to be restrained just as surely as the powers of government need to be restrained.
No article in this constitution shall confer rights only upon natural born persons, nor shall the words “people” and “persons” be construed to include any corporation.
That’s a start.

That should read
No article in this Constitution shall confer rights upon any EXCEPT natural born persons…

The impact of the SCOTUS ruling — activist or not — is not so much about whether or not conservative-leaning special interests will win out over their progressive counterparts; it’s not about whether more Republicans will more easily win seats than Democrats. Rather, the bottom line is that this ruling will, in effect, further pollute an already overwhelming, nauseating, and truth-bending barrage of advertising stimuli.
As aptly noted earlier, the organizations who make it their mission to sort out truthful claims from bogus ones will undoubtedly have to surrender to an even larger stream of truth-twisting, partisan hackery. And while I’d like to believe that, as Indy contends above, moderates will simply be repulsed by the increasingly ideological (and negative) messages perpetually streaming through our consciousness, I’m afraid that the more likely outcome will (at best) see more and more people utterly turned off from participatory democracy and (at worst) produce an ever-larger swath of the electorate that is thoroughly confused and incapable of (or unwilling to) sort through the BS and arrive at an informed, rational choice. More and more people will, in effect, either give up on our political process altogether or simply fall prey to whoever can shout the loudest and the longest (regardless of political persuasion).
I recently spent a study-abroad semester in the UK, and was both shocked and impressed by their elections process: five weeks before election day, the ruling party calls elections. Though much work is done behind the scenes (by all parties involved) before the actual election season begins, the public is largely spared of the vitriol, fear-mongering, and outright deceptions that so often mark our elections. And though British politicians are no angels, their electorate seems more sane — certainly less nauseated — and yet capable of making an informed decision. Maybe 35 days is too short; maybe other aspects of Brit elections make them just as beholden to corporate interests as our candidates are. But the American predilection for a “no limits” campaign is simply delusional and will, unaltered, erode the foundations of democracy that depend upon informed participation.

Ah yes, “We, the Corporations …” has SUCH a nice ring to it.
The “people” (the real, live ones, that is) are the big losers in this.

Siarlys,
“A corporation is not a person. Period. Only natural born persons have constitutional rights.”
Sadly, you are wrong.

Your Name, you are both right and wrong. You are right as to the current state of the law, and you are right that it is sad. However, common sense and divine providence, as modestly invoked in the Declaration of Independence, counsel otherwise. Vindicating the latter will require a constitutional amendment. We have been drafting one at Alexandria, Crossroads of Civilization. I offer the latest text for comment from anyone here. The more critique and improvement the better, and then we all need to batter the email inputs of our elected representatives:
Incorporation is a privilege granted by the sovereign people, by and through their elected representatives, when it shall seem good or expedient to promote the general welfare:
1)Except as provided in this article, nothing in this Constitution shall be construed as extending any right, privilege, or immunity to any corporation; nor shall the terms “person” and “people,” as employed in this Constitution, be construed to encompass corporations.
2)Natural persons who exercise their right peaceably to assemble to petition the government for redress of grievances, to exercise in common any rights, privileges and immunities protected by the First Amendment to this Constitution, or for collective bargaining or advocacy, shall not be impaired in the exercise of those rights because they choose to incorporate, solely for that purpose, nor shall freedom of the press be infringed when exercised by a corporation formed primarily for that purpose.
3)Neither the United States nor any state shall deprive any corporation of property without due process of law; nor deny any corporation the equal protection of laws applicable to other corporations similarly situated.
4) Powers not explicitly granted to a corporation by its charter, or by generally applicable laws governing all corporations similarly situated, are reserved to the states, to the Congress in exercising its enumerated power to regulate commerce, and to the people.

I am always against this type of rule like “Campaign finance ruling”….Here is good describe “Campaign finance ruling — good or bad? ” in very nice way.
http://www.financialculture.com/