THE US SUPREME COURT: THE MORE YOU DIG, THE DIRTIER IT GETS

This bad decision by the US Supreme Court could be the beginning of the end of our democracy as we know it.

...Five of these Justices don't deserve to be on the US Supreme Court

It´s amazing how many readers immediately jumped on my article last week regarding the outlandish decision by the most activist US Supreme Court in over 100 years. In fact, the more I´ve dug into how the decision came about, the more questionable it became, as you will see below. (And virtually every Supreme Court Justice had sworn under oath that they would not challenge precedence and they would not make legal decisions from the bench.) Well, you will now have to forget that!

Unfortunately, this latest decision that allows corporations to spend unlimited funds on US elections is so dire that it quickly started being compared to the 1857 Dred Scott case that said slaves were not "persons". The court decision back then said that they were instead, "property to be bought and sold". That decision eventually caused what eventually became the US Civil War. This latest court decision now says just the opposite. The decision now says that "property", i.e. corporations, are "persons".

The Chief Justice in the Dred Scott case was Justice Roger B. Taney. After the civil war, a then indignant Senator Charles Sumner stated, in regards to funding a marble statue of the Chief Justice, "If a man has done evil in his life, he must not be complimented in marble." Instead, Sumner proposed that a vacant spot, not a bust of Taney, be left in the courtroom "to speak as a warning to all who would betray liberty!" I would hope that the same is done for Chief Roberts and his 4 associates.

Our premier founding father, Thomas Jefferson, said in one of his many writings about freedom and aristocracy that America already had its own aristocracy in the form of its "corporations". Jefferson went on to say that America´s corporations must be kept in check because, as in England, it was their aristocracies and corporations that had ignored the common man and that they had always fought against any real development of a true British middle class.

Over 100 years ago, an American politician declared that there were, "Two very important items that that anyone running for a political office must have. The first item is that they must have access to lots of money……..And I can´t recall what the second item was." The US Supreme Court has just decided that corporations can now "buy" whomever they need in government for obtaining the political decisions they need for growing their businesses.

In my previous article, I used a hypothetical example of a Chinese corporation in the US, and what under this new decision, they could do to influence or to "buy" a local politician or influence a political election.

This weekend, I heard another hypothetical story that I would like to pass on that further demonstrates just how dangerous this decision could be to our democracy, our freedom and to America´s national security.

Let´s just say for example, a US company calling itself Al Qaeda, Inc. incorporates in the United States by a group of Muslim fundamentalists. Now these Muslims are all certified US citizens that currently follow the Muslim faith and none of them have done anything illegal in the US. Their company, Al Qaeda, Inc. is allegedly organized for the promotion of their faith and for building tax-exempt Muslim Mosques all over America.

Based on this new US Supreme Court decision, Muslim money from outside the country could legally be brought into the US (even indirectly from Osama´s al Qaeda?) to support this organization. This new corporation could now select any politician to support and they could donate unlimited funds to that politician for supporting their causes.

They can now also donate unlimited money around the country to influence where their Mosques are to be built. And of course, the US Constitution prevents the US or local authorities from entering these facilities for finding out what kind of business is actually being done inside these religious structures.

Yes, this is a far-fetched concept, but from a legal perspective, this could actually happen and it would be perfectly "kosher" under US laws.

What has also been so disgusting about this latest decision is how it all came about.

It is now becoming clear that the five conservative US justices had no intention of dealing with the original question from the Hillary Clinton campaign case that started all this legal activity. And as a case in fact, the original question from the case was never asked and never settled. It is now clear that the case was pursued just so that it could eventually get to the Supreme Court so that the 5 conservative judges could use it to overturn the election reforms that had been achieved over the past 100 years.

According to the briefs presented to the court, the original legal question about whether the anti-Hillary Clinton Film was illegally paid for with corporate funds was never even asked. Once this case made it into the court, Chief Justice Roberts had apparently already decided to put it on a "Fast-Trak" that brought it to the court in September. (Most cases don´t even get to the US Supreme Court for 1-2 years.)

Chief Roberts then decided to ignore the original question and instead to use it for dealing with the overall campaign reform issue. That decision allowed them to get to a final court decision this early, which just happens to be in time for the campaigns to begin collecting "unlimited donations for the November mid-term elections".

As I said, this is the "most political activist US Supreme Court in over 100 years". As devastating as the Dred Scott case was to the country, this case challenges the heart of America´s democracy. Since when is it democracy for those with all the gold, foreign or domestic, to be legally allowed to purchase those that run the country? Yes, this has been going on behind the scene for years, but now the US Supreme Court has made it legal and it can all be funded by foreign money.

Not only are the founding fathers turning over in their graves, so are my own forefathers that fought and some died to save this great nation.

Copyright G.Ater 2010

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