There is a powerful movement among the ranks of government trusters to allow government vastly more power in the area of political regulation.
This movement sometimes calls itself a “campaign finance reform movement” and promotes its pro-government agenda by means of certain innocuous-sounding slogans. It posits that the influence of the private sector on politics must be curtailed or limited by government.
Every single claim made by these campaign-finance “reformers” is untrue. And the entirety of this “reform movement” threatens fundamental principles of First Amendment law.
Yesterday, August 28, 2015, the Bozeman Daily Chronicle (a Montana newspaper that has been feeding its readers a steady diet of deceptive “campaign-finance-reform” messaging) published a front-page (above-the-fold) feature story bearing the headline, “Political complaint filed against Gianforte.”
Here is the link to the BDC article.
Upon reading this, many people would be forgiven for supposing the Montana gubernatorial candidate was being investigated for bribery or other corruption.
But the guy is being investigated for–wait for it–purchasing a domain name and hiring a staffperson before notifying the government that he was going to run for governor. Apparently, the government wants to know EACH AND EVERY MOVE OR IDEA that a person makes or has that might lead to political campaigning.)
Campaign finance “reformers” would actually take American speech and press law back to the days when presses needed to be government-licensed. They seek to create a landscape in which EVERY STEP that a person makes toward criticizing the state must be state approved.
(Note: nothing in this discussion should suggest any support whatsoever for candidate Gianforte.)
