Citizens United: Silver Linings & Opportunities

For those concerned about special-interest spending in elections, today's Citizens United ruling was an unmistakable setback. This ruling pours gasoline on an already raging bonfire that will affect all federal and state elections. And it will pose an especially grave threat to the integrity of elected state courts.

But today's Citizens United ruling does have a silver lining: it explicitly says that corporations that pay to play in elections can be forced to disclose their financial sources. Companies running so-called independent campaigns can literally spend infinite amounts. But they do not have a constitutional right to do so anonymously.

The ruling thus gives clear guidance to state and federal lawmakers that they can pass disclosure laws, to provide desperately needed sunlight in a new era of runaway election spending. Moreover, it is a hopeful sign that First Amendment attacks, which have been used as a battering ram against legitimate election laws, may have reached their upper limit with the Citizens United case.

In today's ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court said businesses can spend directly from their treasuries on federal elections-a ruling that could unleash a tsunami of campaign cash. And that's clearly just the beginning. As quickly as they can be cranked out, new lawsuits will demand equal rights for unions-and for spending on state and local elections, not just federal campaigns.

It's easy to imagine where this will lead, especially for those who focus on the specialized area of judicial elections.

Just last year, the Supreme Court faced all the potential worst-case scenarios when it issued a landmark ruling in Caperton v. Massey. In that case, a coal executive spent $3 million to elect a new justice to West Virginia's high court, as his company sought to overturn a $50 million jury award.

The U.S. Supreme Court forced the judge off the case, but it got a powerful sneak preview of what Citizens United could spawn. Remarkably, the money spent in the West Virginia election all came out of the executive's private finances. Now it's likely that he and other CEOs, as well as union chiefs, will ultimately turn business treasuries into personal election-campaign piggy banks.

Justice John Paul Stevens clearly had the Caperton case in mind when he wrote the following in his eloquent dissent:

The consequences of today's holding will not be limited to the legislative or executive context. The majority of the States select their judges through popular elections. At a time when concerns about the conduct of judicial elections have reached a fever pitch, see, e.g., O'Connor, Justice for Sale, Wall St. Journal, Nov. 15, 2007, p. A25; Brief for Justice at Stake et al. as Amici Curiae 2, the Court today unleashes the floodgates of corporate and union general treasury spending in these races. Perhaps "Caperton motions" will catch some of the worst abuses. This will be small comfort to those States that, after today, may no longer have the ability to place modest limits on corporate electioneering even if they believe such limits to be critical to maintaining the integrity of their judicial systems.

Given the historic purpose of campaign finance laws -- to prevent large concentrations of money from corrupting officials and undermining public trust in government -- that's hardly an inspiring prospect. And it might have been avoided had the court decided only the original question, of whether federal election law should apply to a video-on-demand documentary that criticized a presidential candidate.

So where are the silver linings in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission? Where are election reformers now that the ruling has been handed down?

The disclosure ruling is significant, and it potentially affects all elections, federal and state. While it struck down Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce's 1990 ban on corporate spending, the Supreme Court reaffirmed multiple Supreme Court rulings that campaign disclosure laws are consistent with the First Amendment. The Roberts Court, which is skeptical of campaign regulation, upheld rulings dating back to Buckley v. Valeo in 1976, which found that disclosure of election spending provides vital public information and helps combat corruption. Significantly, this ruling covers expenditures by independent campaigns whose goal is to influence election outcomes.

Lawmakers can and should now move without any fear of meaningful litigation to start a new era of sunlight on special-interest spending in all elections. And these laws should specifically bring a public accounting to the many groups that have used "independent" ad campaigns to skirt reporting rules.

One also can hope that this vote will leak some air out of a First Amendment overreach that has besieged courts in recent years. Despite statements to the contrary, federal courts have upheld most campaign finance laws against First Amendment challenges, choosing only to carve out specific exceptions, such as the "millionaire's amendment" in Davis v. FEC.

With the Supreme Court now rejecting the simplistic argument that all forms of campaign regulation violate free-speech, perhaps courts everywhere will pause and look more skeptically at the continuing assault on public financing and other laws.

This is especially true in the area of court elections. A second silver lining recent years is that the Supreme Court and lower tribunals recognize that courts have special constitutional obligations, which must be weighed against free-speech claims. In Caperton, for instance, the court said there is no First Amendment right to the judge of one's choice. A citizen can support any candidate for the bench. But if he goes to court, the Fourteenth Amendment may, for due process and fairness, require that another judge hear the case. Justice Kennedy, in the majority opinion, reaffirmed that in Citizens United.

Similarly, the conservative Fourth Circuit of Appeals unanimously upheld North Carolina's public financing law for appellate court races. In its 2008 ruling in Duke v. Leake, which the Supreme Court declined to hear, the Fourth Circuit wrote: "The concern for promoting and protecting the impartiality and independence of the judiciary ... dates back at least to our nation's founding," adding that the provisions "to protect this vital interest in an independent judiciary are within the limits placed on the state by the First Amendment."

Even if courts continue to chip away at specific campaign regulations, an argument can still be made that rulings such as Caperton and Duke v. Leake should provide a special protective shield around elections involving the courts.

No matter what, those who care about keeping courts impartial need to turn bad news into good news, by moving to enact real reforms-including disclosure, recusal, public financing and appointive systems - to make sure justice is not for sale.

[Image via HatCityBLOG.]