Supreme Court Upholds Free Speech

Libertarians should be drinking up about now. The Supreme Court, in this ruling, CITIZENS UNITED v. FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION, have apparently swept away those torturous campaign finance restrictions that tried to keep corporations, unions and other organizations from financing commercials and other public debate.

The First Amendment does not permit laws that force speakers to retain a campaign finance attorney, conduct demographic marketing re-search, or seek declaratory rulings before discussing the most salient political issues of our day.

Personally, I'm cheering, but Congress will undoubtedly come back with another attempt to keep you from banding together and saying anything that might affect an incumbent.

Honestly, just having Congress able to write laws that affect who can speak in what time and place has a chilling effect on our ability to discuss the issues, since it takes money, or a big group of people, to get that discussion going. I think that "Congress Shall Make No Law" should be taken more literally than they do.