Uh-oh, hedge fund managers and Goldman Sachs partners. Obviously, few of you are evangelical Christians. So this guy, who wants good markets, has his sights set on you. But, luckily not on that carried-interest tax-benefit thing y’all get to use, praise the Lord. So maybe you hedge-fund types can skip church again this Sunday, after […]
“There is no right more basic in our democracy than the right to participate in electing our political leaders.” That’s how Roberts began the opinion. So I guess we can now assume that the Court will strike down all those voter-ID laws that so clearly impact that most basic of rights, and will do so […]
It’s already become something of a favorite parlor game among liberals, especially among liberal law geeks, to speculate about when the Supreme Court will strike down state and federal statutes that prohibit corporations from making direct campaign contributions to candidates and political parties. In Citizens United, the court killed statutory bars to corporate and union political […]
When donors furnish widely distributed support within all applicable base limits, all members of the party or supporters of the cause may benefit, and the leaders of the party or cause may feel particular gratitude. That gratitude stems from the basic nature of the party system, in which party members join together to further common […]
When [U.S. Solicitor General Donald] Verrilli said the Court has never found a right to exercise religion for corporations, Alito wondered if there was something wrong with the corporate form that it would not be accorded religion freedom rights. Did Verrilli agree, Alito said, with a lower court’s view that the only reason for a […]
[The] conception of corporate personhood has profound and beneficial economic consequences. It means that the obligations the law imposes on the corporation, such as liability for harms caused by the firm’s operations, are not generally extended to the shareholders. Limited liability protects the owners’ personal assets, which ordinarily can’t be taken to pay the debts […]
Religious liberty, [Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals] Judge Tymkovich wrote, cannot turn on whether money changes hands. “Would an incorporated kosher butcher really have no claim to challenge a regulation mandating non-kosher butchering practices?” he asked. — Court Confronts Religious Rights of Corporations, Adam Liptak, New York Times, today Why, yes, Judge Tymkovich, of course […]
I received the following email from Dan Crawford last evening: Fwd: Blog Post Idea: SCOTUS Must Protect Free Speech in Ohio and Beyond Is this interesting? ———- Forwarded message ———- From: Kristen Thomaselli <kristen@keybridge.biz> Date: Wed, Sep 11, 2013 at 6:25 PM Subject: Blog Post Idea: SCOTUS Must Protect Free Speech in Ohio and Beyond To: angrybearblog@gmail.com […]
Yes, that’s right. Scalia said Citizens United was wrongly decided. He said it yesterday, at the argument on the constitutionality of California’s Prop. 8. He also said that the right to bear arms doesn’t, after all, preclude the federal government and the states from enacting gun-ownership restrictions as they wish, so the recent Court opinions […]
I think Thomas Jefferson would have said the more speech, the better. That’s what the First Amendment is all about. So long as the people know where the speech is coming from. … You are entitled to know where the speech is coming from — you know, information as to who contributed what. — Justice […]