This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Wednesday, July 1st, 2009.

I'm Caleb Brown.

A major free speech case will be re-heard by the US Supreme Court,

heightening the possibility of overturning a key

restriction on advocacy during elections. Commenting of the so-called

Hillary the movie case, John Samples, director of the Cato Institute's

Center for Representative Government,

and author of The fallacy of Campaign Finance Reform.

The Supreme Court has decided to ask for a rehearing of the case of Citizens United.

And specifically, on the question of overruling

two earlier precedents that the court had had in campaign finance.

Part of it being the somewhat notorious case of McConnell versus Federal Election Commission, but the more important one being a

more important one being a case called Austin versus Michigan Chamber of Commerce

which was decided in 1989.

The facts of that case are pretty straightforward. The Michigan

Chamber of Commerce which received money from business corporations had

taken out an ad in support of a candidate for the House of Representatives.

At the same time, the state of Michigan had a law that was not an uncommon law

to, that prohibited corporations from

spending any of their Treasury funds directly in elections like

supporting candidates for office so the question was whether that Michigan law violated the First Amendment. And in 1989, the Supreme Court said it did not violate the First Amendment.

The state could prohibit a corporation from spending money on elections even when they

...