Issue Position: Corporations Are Not People

Issue Position

"A politics that is not sensitive to the concerns and circumstances of people's lives, a politics that does not speak to and include people, is an intellectually arrogant politics that deserves to fail." --Senator Paul Wellstone

On January 21st, 2010 the Supreme Court made a landmark decision by allowing corporations to engage in freedom of speech by spending an unlimited amount of money in political campaigns.

"With a single, disastrous 5-to-4 ruling, the Supreme Court has thrust politics back to the robber-baron era of the 19th century. Disingenuously waving the flag of the First Amendment, the court's conservative majority has paved the way for corporations to use their vast treasuries to overwhelm elections and intimidate elected officials into doing their bidding."

This means that corporate interests, foreign or domestic, will now have an unlimited power to bully and silence individual thought. You want to run a campaign to end a war? Haliburton would run unlimited ads against your candidacy. You want to run a campaign to ensure all Americans have access to health care? Massive insurance companies will surely crush you.

"If a member of Congress tries to stand up to a wealthy special interest, its lobbyists can credibly threaten: We'll spend whatever it takes to defeat you."

Americans have had to reverse destructive Supreme Court decisions with constitutional amendments in the past. I support such action here: a constitutional amendment clarifying once and for all that corporations are not people, money is not speech, and the Bill of Rights is a bill of human right.

Since the days of the Copper Kings in Butte, Montanans have stood unified in their unequivocal opposition to the idea of allowing fat cats and out-of-state interests from buying political power.

I will propose that a unified Montana legislature send a message to Montana's Congressional delegation, that Congress must act immediately to limit the damage of this radical decision, which strikes at the heart of democracy.

New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/opinion/22fri1.html

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