I’d like to punch you in the fucking face.

“Those who see such freedoms as a threat to society and the democratic process should question their conception of government as a coercive agent of wealth redistribution and social engineering; perhaps this is the real threat.”

You’re being a confrontational idiot on purpose, got it. No one is actually this dumb.

Is this an “editorial” crafted using the talking points of a corporate PR department?

If you cant give it a social security number then it cant have first amendment rights

Clarence Thomas has something to say about this as well: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/04/us/politics/04scotus.html?hp

Nice mullet Jim.

Does the kind of “wealth distribution” you fear include the government scholarship you got through undergrad on? If you didn’t have a scholarship, how about the student loans?

The primary purpose of Jim’s letter was freedom of speech and the courts defense of that. However, many of you responding to this letter are arguing about the result of the ruling to the election process. Although this is really incidental to the argument of free speech or not free speech, I’d like to make an observation of the devastating results campaign reform can do to the election process. As of now, certain qualified candidates can get their campaign finances from the government if they follow certain rules for getting the rest of their money. Whether they take the money or not there are other rules telling them how much they can get and from whom. Does anyone see a problem with this? Doesn’t that imply that the government should decide who should be allowed to run and who should not? In fact many supporters advocate that we can solve the problem by having all campaign money come from the government. If we do that, why not just cut out all the money and have the government appoint the candidate? This is not a fictitious scenario, it is what is going on and exemplifies the conflict of interest that should be of real concern. We have the fox guarding the chicken coop.

To the person that said I’d like to punch you in the * face.

I believe this is a sarcastic remark, but I’m never quite sure. I don’t suppose you would like to confirm that or not. I mean it is pretty funny to make this comment about a letter on free speech and the use of force.

This is not protecting our first amendment. the points made in this piece remind me of same type of arguments that bible thumpers use when they take the “word of god” way too literally. yes, this does in some twisted way adhere to the first amendment, but do you think our forefathers were worried about protecting the voices of the world’s largest corporations? No, the first amendment is there so the poor and the middle class are not silenced. silence is exactly what will happen to american citizens if corporations are given the ability to rule over our government; whichever way one wants to rationalize, corporations are not invidual citizens. there is this part in our brains where we all have this piece of what i like to call “common sense.” honestly, what kind of person can sit and rationalize that this decission will be better for America, better for freedom? i’m sorry the writer seems to be an intelligent person in certain ways, but if he really believes that this is what America needs he must simply be ignorant. he truly does not understand life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. we should pity people like this, not hate them.

“It is not the power of money that wields a club and carries a gun, but the power of Washington. Corporations, regardless of their wealth, have only the power to voice their opinions and persuade others;…”

Why do these corporations maintain this power? MONEY! The age old saying ‘money is power and power is money’ should not be forgotten. What is important to take from this case is the fact that big corporations are being heard (and with constitutional rights to back them up) while the average citizen (with a worth in assets that is less than Monopoly money to these big companies) are rarely given the opportunity to affect legislation directly.

It all comes down to money. It fuels almost every decision made in congress, whether we like it or not.

I don’t really care what Jim Allard has to say—I can always decline to read his bullshit. However, I do have a real concern that I might run into Jim Allard on the street someday. I can never un-see a coif like that.

wow, the hatred.

in the words of chief justice john marshall, “we must never forget that it’s a constitution we’re expounding” (MARBURY V. MADISON). the constitution, through previous rulings, has held that corporations are legal persons entitled to some constitutional rights. all citizens united v. fec did was say, corporations maintain a same right to engage in political speech as natural persons. furthermore, the case signaled the end to a stratification of speech in which political speech was held in lesser regard than obscenities, pornography and offensive speech. those who claim to respect and adhere to the constitution should be celebrating such a ruling as citizens. i certainly am as i am sure former justice hugo black is from the grave. but the fall-out from this, as evident by the numerous replies to this article, just show how many on the far-left hold corporations and, now, the constitution in contempt. though the new york times editorialized the case as a “blow to democracy”, it is the far-left’s blinded consequentialist predisposition here that is a “blow to democracy”. and for all those fire-breathers out there, how many actually have taken the time to read the opinions and dissents? huh? if i were a betting man, i would put a lot of money that nearly none have. go read it and come back with informed opinions, not just political spite regurgitated from what you read on the huffington post, the new republic, mother jones, new york times or actually saw on msnbc.

Just a reminder. The only reason money can influence congress is because government is involved in things not permitted by the constitution. Let’s get the government out of economics and get them back in defending freedom, including free speech as the court has suggested. Hard to imagine that even banking was private as recent as 1913 when the Federal reserve was created. Yes we actually survived without central banking.

“Putting aside his pompous disregard for separation of powers and the standard list of leftist villains, we find a gross inversion of where power actually lies.” Such a true statement. Thanks for writing this, Jim. Great work.

“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and ‘Atlas Shrugged.’ One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.”

Well, Jim Allard, it’s quite evident you have no problem with government, as long as government is manifested by a Judicial Branch that “validates” the absurd, self-serving, pathological and destructive notion of “Corporate Personhood.” You’re all FOR a Supreme Corporate Court that eliminates the minimal existing limitations on corporate campaign donations. You’re all FOR a government branch or agency that allows massive, obscenely wealthy institutions like Exxon-Mobil or Microsoft to exercise unlimited influence in Congress. Or the Executive. Or any other aspect of the American political process.

Your “reasoning,” to the effect that these often monstrous entities are simply composed of numerous individuals is transparently specious. Sure, a few individuals, like New York Mayor and media mogul Bloomberg, Microsoft honcho Bill Gates, and currency-trader/political activist/”philanthropist” George Soros have the kind of megabucks it takes to game the system. But financial behemoths who can assume the role of big-time players are the exception, not the rule. I haven’t that kind of money, power and influence; ironically, neither do you, unless you’re a lot wealthier than anyone ever dreamed.

Thanks to this Court’s disgusting ruling, which you salivate over, the impending mid-term congressional elections promise to be more compromised than ever. We can expect the airwaves to become absolutely flooded with advertisements, bought by the highest bidders. This socio-economic arrangement, which you label “Freedom” is really the economic analog of a political philosophy known as Fascism. It’s corporate hegemony at its worst, where you can have just as much “democracy” as you can purchase! The situation here in the United States is now doomed to become yet more pyramidal, more hierarchical, with the huge money interests running ever more rampant in their insatiable quest to control EVERYTHING. To OWN people, places and things. To patent living creatures. To destroy the environment to an extent that will make the Exxon Valdez spill or the Three Mile Island Meltdown look like minor glitches.

In general, it’s time to ABOLISH once and for all the absurd and twisted notion that corporations are persons! If that were true, and they ARE homo-sapiens, when can we “arrest” Goldman-Sachs for embezzlement or jaywalking? Better yet, when can we sentence AIG to death for massive fraud and for “his” role in bringing on the current global recession?

R.I.P. “Democracy.”

Great article, Jim. And kudos to “Argumentum ad baculum” and “ad hominem” for nailing the spurious responses. Let me double-check something here: Those attacking comments were from college students? Reminds me more of junior high / middle school thugs who “think” with their their fists instead of their minds.

Come on, people. Act like you’re civilized.

Apparently corporations buying advertisements FORCES you to vote for whatever they advocate for. But I’m sure all the Commies on this post would NEVER vote for what a corporation says. So where’s the coercion?? In the end, it is the voters, not the advertisements, who are responsible for electing representatives. So if you don’t like your government (I don’t) blame yourself, not Exxon Mobil.

Brava Jim Allard! The seething, unhinged responses from Leftists on this thread are undeniable evidence that your commentary hit the mark. Bulls-eye!

this guy needs to get laid. and assuming he doesn’t, he will probably go back to wacking off with the $100 bills that his rich daddy sends him every week.

Very nice article Jim. One of your best.

Let me get this straight… the same people who argue that unions of laborers voicing an opinion as a single entity by utilizing their collective labor are an abomination to the free market also believe that allowing large and powerful groups of businessmen to voice an opinion as one entity with their collective pool of money is a perfectly allowable thing in the free market of ideas? If you say so…

Corporations are not humans. Corporations don’t have rights; humans have rights. A corporation does not have freedom of speech (kind of a moot point, since a corporation can’t speak), but the humans making up the corporation are free to speak for themselves under the first amendment. The only way I can see a “corporation” having any sort of voice is if that voice is the unanimous consensus of every individual comprising that corporation. Otherwise, we just simply have individuals giving their opinion and backed by their own buying power, just like everyone else.

Great article Jim