"No law" means no law to respect

I get really discouraged sometimes, and it's almost always over intractable human stupidity.

McCain Feingold is the worst disaster that ever befell the First Amendment, and yet the damned fools who passed it illegally sit idly by while the mischief grows.

The idea of assigning a monetary value to speech so that it can be regulated as a "contribution" is so utterly repugnant to our tradition that it's just mind boggling.

Just wait till the bureaucrats, lawyers, and various meddlers sink their teeth into this labyrinth.

Once it begins to sink in that employers become campaign contributors for words their employees issued at work, then daytime blogging as we know it will be all but abolished for everyone except the self employed. Bloggers will be fired, government scrutiny of business and Internet records will be invited as never before, and why? Because Congress failed to understand the meaning of four simple words: "shall make no law."

If these provisions are not repealed, the only remedies will be impeachment (impossible, because the bastards have safety in numbers), or massive civil disobedience.

It never should have come to this.

As I said before, when Congress is without power to make a law, any law which purports to issue is by definition a nullity. The restrictions on free speech are as valid as Gavin Newsom's same sex marriage licenses.

Even the issue of "respect for law" is premature without a valid law to respect.

MORE: Glenn Reynolds earlier pointed to some good questions about the so-called "media exemption":

Why is somebody who prints up and mails out weekly vanity newsletter entitled to the media exemption but not me?

Why is Michael Savage entitled to the media exemption but not me?

Why is Salon.com entitled to the media exemption but not me?

To which I'd add, why would "Classical" Values be less entitled to the "media exemption" than "Traditional" ones?

There's no rational answer that I can find. Unless the country has been magically transformed from "Congress shall make no law" to "free speech for me(dia) but not for thee."

Anyway, I'm glad to see all sides of the blogosphere agree on something this important. Here's Daily Kos's AC Bonin:

...as you probably know, it is generally illegal to devote any resources of a corporation towards political activity. They've established a "safe harbor", however, which states that if it's not more than one hour a week, or four hours a month, then it's not significant enough to regulate -- and they want to extend this to the use of a corporation's computers and internet access as well. Clearly, that's not enough for the users here who work at corporations, but can you think of a better way to allow you to do what you do here -- while protecting us from Wal-Mart establishing "Blog On Behalf Of Your Favorite Republican Day" for their officials?
More at RedState.

And here's Feingold himself:

at this point, I don't see any reason why the FEC shouldn't include legitimate online journalists and bloggers in the "media exemption" rule.
Well isn't that charitable of him to offer bloggers "inclusion" in the First Amendment! What outrages me is to see such arrogance passed off as conciliation. Where did Russ Feingold get the right to decide whose First Amendment rights are worth protecting and whose are not?

What does he think he is? Commissar of Speech?

MORE: Does my blog non-partisan effort need to obtain 501(c) status in order to escape the long arm of the FEC? And do I also have to stop calling it a blog?

(Before anyone laughs too hard, why isn't "END THE CULTURE WAR BY RESTORING CLASSICAL VALUES" a charitable purpose?)

posted by Eric on 07.01.05 at 12:03 AM





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Comments

Makes me miss the good old days when the main First Amendment issue that everybody debated about was censorship of obscenity. That, at least, was a lot sexier.

Dear Eric:

'Twas good to see you commenting in that fascinating thread on Rand and Heinlein in Dean's World.

I'm not much of a commenter, but I thought they might like additional info.

Eric Scheie   ·  July 1, 2005 07:56 AM

As Bastiat said, "If you want the law to be respected, you should make the law respectable."

Aristomedes   ·  July 1, 2005 08:52 AM

(I'm the AC Bonin referred to above; I'm serving as attorney for some of the bloggers involved in this rulemaking.)

Unfortunately, the filed comments by Sen. Feingold and the BCRA sponsors were not nearly as charitable:

"Some bloggers ought to be considered part of the media for purposes of the media exemption. Others probably should not. A number of factors are relevant to that question, including whether the blogger receives payments from a campaign, solicits money for candidates, and engages in news gathering or editorializing. In the end, however, since most if not all bloggers will be covered by the exemption included in the
proposed rule for individual or volunteer Internet activity, whether the media exemption applies will be irrelevant to whether the FECA applies to their activities."

Let me explain: if you are a group blog or an incorporated blog, you may have serious trouble under such an approach.

Adam B.   ·  July 1, 2005 09:49 AM

Adam B. wrote:
"Let me explain: if you are a group blog or an incorporated blog, you may have serious trouble under such an approach."

I don't like that at all. It sounds like Blogs For Bush will definitely be targeted. My friend Mark Noonan, one of the most interesting conservative (and Catholic) commenters in Dean's World, is also one of the Bloggers For Bush. I don't like any of this on little bit.

No, I would say that the problem is that the Supreme Court cannot read.

Rob McMillin   ·  July 1, 2005 02:24 PM


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