Plumas Citizens United R
Plumas County Board of Supervisors Passes Resolution Against Citizens United 051612
The Plumas County Board of Supervisors yesterday passed a resolution against the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United. The 2010 SCOTUS 5-4 decision favored Citizens United, a right wing reactionary and nationalistic group fighting “one world governments” and other inevitable features of the 21st century. The group wanted to advertise Hillary; the movie which portrays then presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as the middle class schoolmarm she is.
Hillary: she’ll keep you after school
The Federal Election Commission determined that the expenditure would be illegal. CU argued before the Supreme Court that it constituted a “person” under the 14th Amendment, a court tradition since 1819, stated in clerk’s notes in 1886. The intention, it seems, of the early interpretations is that corporations are aggregates of persons, and in the interest of court consistency, they would generally be afforded those rights of individual persons. It was a convenient legal fiction, as most legal fiction is convenient. The intention doesn’t seem to be to give corporations all the rights of humans. But the five right wing members of the Supreme Court decided to grant these legal fictions the right of free speech, as though a super political action committee had been endowed by the Creator with a will and a tongue.
But corporations are people in the same way that Campbell's soup is made from Campbells, not at all, and real people have been
pretty pissed about giving corporations unbridled power in the political
arena. To some, Citizens United is
closing the loop of complete corporate power.
By “corporation” we don’t refer to family businesses or even small
businesses, we refer to huge corporations like the prison guards union. These groups already have a disproportionate
share of power.
The Plumas County Board of Supervisors took a bold step in speaking out against the Citizens United decision. Supervisor Lori Simpson responded to a Prospect query with this remark:
"Concerned citizens brought us this resolution to vote on as
their local government reps, we studied it, listened, discussed and
debated and voted to support it in the end. I personally feel that our
federal and state reps spend too much time campaigning (as soon as they
get elected they start campaigning and fundraising for the next
election) when they should be addressing the many critical issues and
problems this country has and start getting problems solved for the
good of the people, (that is what the taxpayers expect!) Corporate and
union money would be better spent creating more jobs in the USA instead
of putting politicans in office. I am tired of big money controlling
our election process and diminishing the votes of the common people."
Plumas County joined a long list of cities, counties and states to legislate or at least complain about the CU decision.
Here is a link to the resolution
Here is a link to a list of efforts to reverse Citizens United
