There were people able to preregister when they were 17 so they could vote at 18. If you ask the vast majority, did they like the early vote period, did they like the right to exercise their constitutional privilege, the answer would be resoundingly yes. And professor raskin, youve heard someone characterize the udall amendment were considering today as an effort to repeal the First Amendment. Now, i dont believe thats accurate, but i hear it in paid ads and others and i guess if some of the billionaires are going to profit by this pay for that enough time advertisements were americans may believe it. Youre a constitutional school lore. If this proposed constitutional amendment were to be ratified would it repeal the First Amendment . Of course not. The first thing we have to remark is that the Citizens United case did not endow a single individual with any right to speak that he or did did not have. All of the employees of the corporation, all of the members of the board, all of the e
There is a role when one senator ofugns the character another, you can rise in a point of personal privilege. Aere is no rule that allows person to rise on that same point of personal privilege. Forth isd canard put money is not speech. That has been repeated over and over again. I would note any first year law student who put that as his or her answer on an exam would f because it is obviously demonstrably false and it has been false since the dawn of the republic. Speech is not just any on a soap screaming on the sidewalk. From the beginning of the republic, the expenditure of money has been integral to speech. The Supreme Court has said that pamphlets, the federalist , took money to distribute, putting up t billboards. Every of those were cars expenditure of money. Every person in this room, if you think about it disagrees with the proposition that expending money is not speech. Publishing a book is speech. Publishing a movie is speech. Ging is is speech blog speech. The third canar
Of 18 critical races. Senator hatch . Thank you, mr. Chairman. Not the only am one to believe you are the leading First Amendment lawyer in the country. Youre not a member of that is true, not yet. I like the thought. Havee very privileged to you here today and grateful to have the other witnesses as well. Mr. Abrams, this is not the First Amendment that proposes frustrations on speech. This one goes beyond what we have seen in the past. As far as i can tell Senate Joint Resolution 19 is the first one for the purpose of achieving what it calls political equality. Under this amendment government could obstetrician only redefine the constitution could redefine equality and decide whose speech should be suppressed or allowed in order to achieve. Isnt this at odds with americas entire history of controlling speech . It is. It gives enormous power to the legislatures, congress, and states to enforce the law. I would assume that the courts would be very deferential to anything that those leg
People have great wealth and wealth gives more power, as has been said. But the effect of this amendment would be to embody into our law by changing substantively, changing and limiting the First Amendment in a way that at the least we are going to have years and years of litigation. But i do not mind that personally. What we are going to have beyond that is a significantly diminished ability to have this sort of ongoing confrontation at length that we have in our electoral process. The 2012 election in my view was a good example of this system working. There was lots of money out there. There was lots of speech. People heard, sometimes more than they wanted to, but they heard the views of the parties and had a chance to vote. That is way the system ought to work, and that is threatened by this legislation this amendment. Professor raskin says the Supreme Courts decision in Citizens United eliminated the provision that kept trillions of dollars in corporate wealth flowing into federal
Obama and the great Government Shutdown debate. I will do everything necessary and Anything Possible to defund obamacare. We cannot let the Government Shutdown. We cannot be, causes or general custer. Tells fox news that we did not use any chemical weapons. A former House Majority leader speaks. He was overwhelmed. He was gratified. A little after 8 00 a. M. Monday morning, aaron alexis, a civilian contractor working on a computer project entered building 197 of the Washington Navy yard with a valid pass. He was carrying a bag in which he held a shotgun, which he had purchased legally in virginia. He walked into the bathroom on the fourth floor, walked out, and began shooting. Before police could take him out, he killed 12 people. He has been four years in the navy reserve and had a pattern of insubordination, absence of leave, and two days in jail after a bar fight. Nevertheless, the navy gave him an Honorable Discharge and was given security clearance to work on a halfdozen military