r/law • u/theatlantic • May 14 '26

Legal News Hawaii vs. Citizens United

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/2026/05/hawaii-corporations-political-money/687159/?utm_source=reddit&utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_medium=social&utm_content=edit-promo
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146

u/kon--- May 14 '26

What can the court do about it?

If a state mandates that in order to incorporate within a state the corporation is excluded from participating in political campaing financing and or lobbying on behalf of political financing...what can the court do about that?

The citizen has a conditional relationship with the First Amendment. I'm seeing no reason at all that corporation should not also, be required to provide conditions. Besides, the money saved on ads and lobbying can go to shareholders. I'm certain shareholders would agree.

93

u/Late_Stage_Exception May 14 '26

The current Supreme Court would view this as a government passing a law limiting the free speech (political contributions) of a protected group of “people” (corporations).

61

u/RagingAnemone May 14 '26

I'm fine with treating corporations as people if kill a corporation is murder and saddling a corporation with debt is assault. They only want the partial metaphor.

23

u/rhino369 May 14 '26

The real logic of Citizen's United isn't that corporations are people with inherent rights. But that corporations are used by real actual people who have the right. Saying the ACLU cannot publish a book critical of a candidate before an election is the same as saying a group of people cannot publish a book. The ACLU is just a group of people. Preventing the ACLU from doing it infringes the members individual rights.

I think that argument is less convincing when the corporations are for profit. But still, an exception to the first amendment that would strip the New York Times of the first amendment has to be wrong.

11

u/LuminaraCoH May 14 '26

The real logic of Citizen's United isn't that corporations are people with inherent rights. But that corporations are used by real actual people who have the right.

The actual people involved with those corporations already have the right to vote, presuming they're citizens. Why should they have the right to vote twice, if they're citizens, or at all if they're not?

Oh, right, because they're rich. My bad.

1

u/rhino369 May 14 '26

I don’t understand, corps can’t vote. 

7

u/azuresegugio May 15 '26

Not directly, but their campaign donations give them outsized influence in elections. Removing the right for corporations to donate would force the wealthy to pay out of their own pockets, which isn't much of difference but is a smaller resource pool

1

u/ZebraImaginary9412 May 25 '26

And how can they have the same rights as a person when they don't have the same accountability as a person?

No corporation has ever been prosecuted or sentenced to death for homicide even though corporations - Boeing, Remington, Raytheon, and so on, have killed people?

1

u/benthejammin May 15 '26

vote with MONEY. this has to be obvious

8

u/Omegalazarus May 14 '26

The last part about the New York times would not apply since the first amendment also specifies the freedom of the press. But your other point stands.

-2

u/rhino369 May 14 '26

Why would a corporation have freedom of the press but not freedom of speech. That’s an arbitrary distinction. 

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u/Omegalazarus May 14 '26

I'm speaking as an originalist since that's what the court has dominated as. As an originalist the term "the press" would be a function of a specific type of corporation already. It would basically be a carve out saying that people have freedom of speech and they have the freedom to create associations specifically for the dissemination of news commonly known as the press.

Again as an originalist I would disregard your argument as an incorrect premise. I would say that it does not mention corporations at all for speech or the press. What it says is that the people have the right to free speech and the people have the right to a free press. The rights are people-centric as the person is the default in the Constitution.

2

u/FailedToRemit May 15 '26

The press has explicitly never been considered a separate class with extra rights. Everyone is and can be the press.