Last Monday 7/23, a critically important (but little-read) diary on Citizen's United and its immediate impact on American political life was posted by Jamie Raskin, professor of constitutional law at American University’s Washington College of Law and a Democratic State Senator in Maryland who chairs the Special Committee on Ethics Reform and serves as Majority Whip. With Prof. Raskin's permission I am reposting the complete diary with some mildly annoying formatting faults edited out.
I hope more folks will read and circulate Prof. Raskin's work with a view to taking positive action to undo the damage inflicted upon Americans by five men on the SCOTUS. For my part, I am also sending the item out to my non-internet-capable folks and linking for my internet-capable contacts.
The repost:
Take Back the Constitution from the Corporate Court
The American people have been forced several times to amend the Constitution to reverse the damage caused by the Supreme Court when it acts in collusion with the enemies of social justice and popular democracy.
In 1857, in the Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court ruled that white supremacy was built into the Constitution as the original intent of the Framers, that African-Americans therefore could not be citizens entitled to bring suit in federal court, and that African-Americans had no rights that the white man was bound to respect. After the Civil War, the Radical Republicans moved to reverse that infamous decision through the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments, which abolished slavery, proclaimed equal protection and due process under the laws, and protected the right to vote of all citizens regardless of race.
In 1875, in Minor v. Hapersett, the Court ruled that the Equal Protection Clause did not protect the right of women to vote, declaring that the domestic sphere was women's proper place. In response, the suffragists mobilized campaigns in the state legislatures and Congress, committed civil disobedience by chaining themselves to the White House fence, and accomplished passage in 1920 of the 19th Amendment.
In 1937, in Breedlove v. Suttles, the Court rejected an Equal Protection attack on the imposition of poll taxes as a condition for voting. This decision cemented the plutocratic and racist practice in many Southern states but the Civil Rights Movement finally won passage of the 24th Amendment in 1964 banning poll taxes in federal elections. Still, many states continued to charge poll taxes for voting in state elections, a practice that did not end until the Court read the 24th Amendment as changing the meaning of Equal Protection and struck it down in Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections (1966).
Indeed, most of the 17 constitutional amendments passed since the Bill of Rights have been franchise-expanding and democracy-reinforcing provisions that strengthen the progress of what Lincoln called “government of the people, by the people and for the people.”
[Much more below the Itzl...]
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