I was disappointed to hear on the radio yesterday that the Supreme Court had ruled in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission that Congress cannot limit “electioneering communications” by corporations and unions.  On its face, this seems logical on free speech grounds: “no law abridging the freedom of speech” seems pretty clear, and the campaign finance laws struck down by the Court did limit speech.

Still, this ruling troubles me on a couple of grounds.  First, I more or less agree with the sentiment that “If money is speech, then speech is not free,” so the equation of speech with money makes me uncomfortable.  Treating the spending of money on purchasing message ads as free speech which cannot be regulated gives an amplified voice to the wealthy.  Large, very profitable corporations will now have a much louder voice than individual citizens, and that’s bad enough.

But some conservatives may have reached a “be careful what you ask for” moment, since they will also have the resources to drown out others in the commercial sector, and this ruling will probably have quite a large distorting effect on markets.  Wal Mart, for example, will now have much more freedom to work for the defeat of local politicians wishing to protect local business culture and flavor against the homogenization of retail in a region.  This new freedom for corporations will probably mean the end of small businesses who share this new freedom, but not the resources to exercise it.

Of course, since the assertion of rights depends on access to court systems, and we manage this access itself as a market, all of our rights claims have always been subject to possession of the necessary financial wherewithal. Wealthy people, whether acting in groups or individually, have far more power to make justice claims than the poor.  This fact, by the way, helps to show that we hold our “rights” only with respect to social relations–they have no intrinsic value separate from our interactions with others, including financial ones.  If they did, we would not organize our adjudication of justice claims around market transactions.

Perhaps more problematic is the deeper placement of corporations in social relationships as the equivalent of citizens.  We treat these collectives in law and rights discussions as individuals, and this begs the question: How long until discourse creates an understanding of corporations as possessing rights besides free speech?  Should corporations have the right to vote?  If the First Amendment protects their speech, does the Second protect their right to keep and bear arms?

The ruling leaves other questions equally unclear.  How, for example, do we define the citizenship of a multinational corporation?  Since our current understanding of “inalienable rights” makes them in fact quite “alienable”–that is, our Constitution does not protect the “natural” rights of non-citizens–this question will come up, and soon.

This may shake out in the “free market of ideas” way libertarians and other conservatives expect.  But many may find that giving corporations the same free speech rights as individual citizens will have unintended consequences they regret, even if it gets more conservative politicians elected.  Be careful what you ask for–you might get it.