Campaign Speech Lies at Heart of First Amendment

Here’s a thought experiment: What percentage of your fellow citizens would have to vote against one of your constitutional rights before it ceased to be a right? Fifty-one percent? Seventy-five? Ninety? I suggest that no such threshold exists. A constitutional right, by definition, is not subject to a vote.

Yet that question was very much at issue recently, when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit heard oral argument in Dinner Table Action v. Schneider. The case tests how far a state may go in limiting contributions to super PACs — political action committees that spend independently and do not coordinate with candidates. My organization, the Institute for Free Speech, represents the plaintiffs challenging the law.

BA

About the Author

Bradley A. Smith

Bradley A. Smith is chairman of the Institute for Free Speech and a former chairman of the Federal Election Commission.

Featured Tags

Here’s a thought experiment: What percentage of your fellow citizens would have to vote against one of your constitutional rights before it ceased to be a right? Fifty-one percent? Seventy-five? Ninety? I suggest that no such threshold exists. A constitutional right, by definition, is not subject to a vote.

Yet that question was very much at issue recently, when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit heard oral argument in Dinner Table Action v. Schneider. The case tests how far a state may go in limiting contributions to super PACs — political action committees that spend independently and do not coordinate with candidates. My organization, the Institute for Free Speech, represents the plaintiffs challenging the law.