February 5, 2010

State of the Union address

Why Justice Thomas doesn't attend -- with comments on Citizens United, too.

February 4, 2010

Federalist Society roundtable on Citizens United

It's getting under way online with participants that include Larry Ribstein (Illinois, Ideoblog) and Howard Wasserman (Florida International, Prawfsblawg).

February 3, 2010

Reason.tv on Citizens United

With Nick Gillespie:

Plus: Heritage has a panel discussion tomorrow in Washington, D.C. on "The Impact of the Citizens United Decision on Federal Elections." And Ilya Shapiro at Cato-at-Liberty explains why "When Individuals Form Corporations, They Don't Lose Their Rights."

January 29, 2010

State of the Union, cont'd

UCLA lawprof Adam Winkler, at HuffPo, says "Alito Was Rude (But Right)". His colleague Stephen Bainbridge invokes Abner Mikva. Bradley Smith at NRO gets into some of the details of foreign money and U.S. politics. And Roger Clegg at NRO catches the President being tendentious on the topic of job-bias enforcement.

More: Randy Barnett (Georgetown) in today's WSJ:

In short, the head of the executive branch ambushed six members of the judiciary, and called upon the legislative branch to deride them publicly. ...

Then there is the substance of the remark itself. It was factually wrong. The Court's ruling in Citizens United concerned the right of labor unions and domestic corporations, including nonprofits, to express their views about candidates in media such as books, films and TV within 60 days of an election. In short, it concerned freedom of speech; in particular, an independent film critical of Hillary Clinton funded by a nonprofit corporation.

While the Court reversed a 1990 decision allowing such a ban, it left standing current restrictions on foreign nationals and "entities." Also untouched was a 100-year-old ban on domestic corporate contributions to political campaigns to which the president was presumably referring erroneously.

That is a whole lot to get wrong in 72 sanctimonious words. Clearly, this statement had not been vetted by the president's legal counsel. Solicitor General Elena Kagan, for example, would never have signed off on such a claim. Never.

January 28, 2010

MSNBC Live, the SOTU, and the Supreme Court

I was on MSNBC Live this afternoon (clip here) discussing the president's State of the Union reference to Citizens United. As is typical for such a forum, the brief discussion focused less on the substance of the Supreme Court's decision and more on the drama of the situation: the president's highly unusual step of calling out the justices in front of him for a specific recent ruling, and Justice Alito's equally unusual reaction to that presidential reference (see Walter's earlier post here).

On the substance, since my time to comment was fairly limited, and I've yet to opine publicly on the decision, I want to clarify a few things about my thoughts:

Continue reading   MSNBC Live, the SOTU, and the Supreme Court

State of the Union: Lip-reading Justice Alito

In his State of the Union message, President Obama claimed the Supreme Court's recent decision in Citizens United would "open the floodgates" for foreign companies to "spend without limit in our elections." Justice Samuel Alito could be seen mouthing words and in particular, per Gerard Magliocca, the phrase "That's not true". For why he might have reacted that way, see Politifact "Truth-o-Meter" (cross-posted from Overlawyered, where there are more links).

January 26, 2010

Around the web, January 26

• "The Coming Counter-Reformation in Securities Litigation" [Boris Feldman via Kevin LaCroix] "Could new regs bring more lawsuits?" [CFO.com]
• "Obama's reckless blast at the Court" [Steve Chapman] Related on Citizens United: Jacob Sullum.
• "Workers seek $500 million over benzene vapor release at Texas City refinery" [SE Texas Record]
• Claim: more California lawyers have turned to dishonesty because of economic recession [Above the Law]
• "$165 Million Schering-Plough Class Action Settlement Includes $37 Million in Fees" [NJLJ, securities fraud]
• "Bonus is poison": a tale of financial managers and their incentives [Hodak Value]

January 25, 2010

"Money isn't speech"

Eugene Volokh shreds one naive objection to the Citizens United decision.

P.S.: The tag-teaming of the hapless David Kairys (Kerr, Volokh) is worth a look too.

P.P.S.: If adversaries spoke of gutting you like a trout you might play politics too [Coyote, with more from Steve Bainbridge and Larry Ribstein] Gerard Magliocca at ConcurOp damns with faint praise ["Citizens United -- Not as Bad As You Think"] More: Ilya Somin, Steve Chapman.

January 22, 2010

Citizens United reactions

Early reactions to the blockbuster free speech decision from Jacob Sullum, Reason; Jonathan Adler; Stephen Bainbridge (and more on the legal personhood of corporations); Ira Stoll with a note on Chuck Schumer; Ilya Somin; and Eugene Volokh (with more on the chilling effect of complexity in speech regulation, on the decline of the theory that broadcasting deserves less First Amendment protection than other speech, on Justice Stevens's contemplated press exception, and on the ruling's effects on mainstream media); Ann Althouse; Larry Ribstein.

P.S. And yes, now that you mention it, it is a rather one-sided list. This just isn't a day when I'm inclined to give the proponents of censorship equal time. For a more nuanced view critical of the decision as disrespectful of precedent, however, see Stuart Taylor, Jr.

January 21, 2010

Citizens United v. FEC, the Supreme Court rules

On the side of the First Amendment, mostly. (Opinion here.)

There are many commentaries and analyses elsewhere, but we did want to link to the Supreme Court's docket of the case. Sixty-eight briefs filed! That's a lot of amici.