Posted by
Always To The Right on Monday, March 16, 2009 3:46:05 PM
What “balance between free speech and political speech”? Free
speech cannot be disconnected from political speech. In fact,
political speech was what the framers of the Constitution meant to
protect in the First Amendment. They understood that a free people had
to have the right to criticize its government and to express political
views without government rationing, censorship, or vendettas. The
notion that one has to balance “free speech” and “political speech” is
an oxymoron of the worst possible kind.
The worst part of this is that the Post actually describes the
effects of the BCRA quite well. Thanks to the legislation more
commonly known as McCain-Feingold, government now gets to determine
when, where, and whether political speech can take place. The Supreme
Court has an opportunity to change that, though it probably won’t
The government wants to regulate the film because it got financing in
part through corporate donations. The First Amendment does not have a
clause that says that Congress can make no law abridging the right of
free speech except when we don’t like who finances the speaker. Unless
the funding is in itself illegal, the government should have no role in
limiting the distribution of this film before an election, or for that
matter, any other political speech or advertising.
The BCRA undermines free political speech by making it a government
concession depending on the calendar. Either political speech is free speech, or free speech doesn’t exist. The Supreme Court should rethink the approach taken by their earlier deliberations and toss the BCRA out altogether.