Activists Work to Overturn Election Rulings

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  Gastonia native Ms. George Friday, working as an advocate for MoveToAmend.org in Washington, speaks to a crowd at Asheville’s Unitarian Universalist Congregation.  Photo: Laura M. Farley  
Staff Reports

Almost 150 people packed the sanctuary of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation on Edwin Place Saturday, July 7, to hear activists David Cobb and George Friday discuss the need to overturn the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission, which declared corporations people and guaranteed them the right to spend unlimited amounts of money on election campaigns.

 

The event was sponsored by Move to Amend of Buncombe County (MABCO), established last winter as a local affiliate of the national Move To Amend coalition working to overturn Citizens United and an earlier decision, Buckley v. Valeo, that declared that money equals speech.

The effect of the two decisions together has been seen in the 2010 and 2012 elections, when unprecedented amounts of money, much of it given anonymously by wealthy individuals and international corporations, has drowned out the voices and impact of regular citizens, activists, and voters.

For example, while nearly a million people signed a petition to recall Tea Party-supported Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker last year, when the recall election took place in June, those same people were able to raise and spend $3.5 million on their efforts. Meanwhile, Walker’s coalition brought in almost $30 million, eight times as much – almost all of it from out-of-state millionaires and corporations — and won.

Closer to home, multimillionaire Art Pope and other NC conservatives spent millions of dollars, directly and indirectly, to elect NC’s first Republican legislative majorities in 140 years; the legislature enacted numerous laws reflecting the wish-list of Pope, the Tea Party, and the corporate-funded American Legislative Exchange Council.

Already for the 2012 presidential election, organizations led by former George W. Bush adviser Karl Rove and others have pledged to spend close to half a billion dollars to defeat President Obama. That money will be in addition to whatever the Republican Party raises, and the only limit on spending it is the rule that it can’t be “coordinated” with the candidate’s campaign.

In their presentation, Cobb and Friday pointed out that the foundation of our democratic republic is that the government is only a creature of the people, and that only the people have inalienable rights. They bestow limited rights on federal, state, and local governments to carry out the wishes of the people who elect them, but otherwise the government itself has no Constitutional rights.

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  David Cobb talks about history.  Photo: Laura M. Farley  

 

Corporations are not mentioned in the Constitution. Established and chartered by the federal government or by states, they exist only because of laws written by those governments, and are given only the rights specifically bestowed upon them. But the Supreme Court’s decision in the two cases cited, as well as in other recent rulings, have granted corporations rights that living people do not enjoy: the right to perpetual life, the right to be free from military service, and the right to be free of the threat of incarceration (since no corporation, only its officers, can be imprisoned, even for the most heinous crimes).

Because there are no rules governing the sources of corporate money, it is even possible that foreign nationals and governments with investments in American-based corporations can have a loud, even overpowering, voice in American elections. Furthermore, the hard-won battles of the Civil Rights movement, especially the Voting Rights Act, could become null and void as corporate-elected legislatures disenfranchise African American voters, seniors, students, and the poor.

The Move to Amend movement was born out of outrage and anger at the Court’s unprecedented decision, and is aiming to build a national movement to overturn it by amending the Constitution. That has been done 17 times since the original Constitution, along with the first ten amendments known as the Bill of Rights, was ratified. The process requires that a bill to amend pass the House of Representatives and the Senate by two-thirds majorities and then be ratified by three-quarters (38) of all states’ legislatures.

At present 14 different bills have been drafted in the House and Senate, though none has gained support of the wide range of elected officials and organizations needed to move forward. In the meanwhile, hundreds of municipalities, organizations, and citizen groups, and one state, Vermont, have passed resolutions calling on Congress to move forward and take action. In North Carolina the municipal governments of Asheville, Carrboro, Chapel Hill, Franklin, Highlands, and Wilmington have all passed such resolutions, and Bryson City, Durham, Sylva, and Orange County have resolutions pending.

The local coalition includes support from Democracy NC, Common Cause, and the Meet/Talk/Act Affinity Group of Occupy Asheville.

For more information visit the national website at www.movetoamend.org or contact local organizer Lew Patrie at [email protected] or phone (828) 299-1242.