As a young political science and philosophy major I learned about types of governments. Among these is the plutocracy—rule by the wealthy. I recall thinking, in my young anarchist days, that all governments were, are and will be plutocracies. After all, the rich always have influence proportional to their wealth and society tends to head in the direction desired by the wealthy. I was aware, of course, that there can be momentary disruptions of the plutocracy. For example, a rebellion or revolution might result in the old rich being killed, exiled or stripped of their wealth. However, history shows that a new rich always emerges (or the old rich return). Even in the allegedly communist states, a wealthy class has always appeared. “Communist” China, after all, has billionaires. The plutocratic system seems eternal.
As might be imagined, my cynical view was countered by some of my friends—they insisted that America was a democracy and not a plutocracy. After all, they argued, the rich do not always get their way in everything and money did not always decide elections. In fact, they pointed out that there were strict restrictions on political spending. A plutocracy would not have such limits. As such, some might conclude that my younger anarchist self was mistaken. But I think, here in 2026, that my young self has been tragically proven right.
Years ago, the infamous Supreme Court ruling allowed unlimited campaign spending by corporations on the grounds that corporations are people, spending is speech and people have a right to free speech. The idea that corporations are people can be easily disproven by a simple reduction ad absurdum: If corporations have the right to free speech because they are people, then they cannot be owned. After all, the Constitution expressly forbids slavery (that is, the ownership of people). To contend that corporations can be owned yet are people who have freedom of speech is to either accept slavery or to fail to grasp the logical notion of consistency. So, a corporation can have freedom of speech, provided it is set free from being owned. Since it is obvious that corporations are things that can be justly owned, it should be obvious that they are not people. As such, they do not get freedom of speech. Naturally, the actual people associated with corporations have their right to freedom of speech. What remains is, of course, the matter of whether spending is speech or not.
On 4/2/2014 the Supreme Court struck down the aggregate campaign contribution limits. This was based, not surprisingly, on the Citizens United ruling in 2010. That ruling included the absurd claim that the influence and access offered unlimited spending is not a concern in regard to corruption. The years since then have proven the obvious: unlimited spending invites corruption.
The case was brought by Shaun McCutcheon—a very wealthy Republican donor. The impact of his victory is that a single donor, such as McCutcheon, can contribute millions to parties, candidates and PACs. The ruling did leave some limits in place: an individual can give: $2,600 per candidate, per election; $32,400 to political party committees per year; and $5,000 per PAC, per year. The main change was there is no longer an overall cap to the total donations. Previously, a donor could not give more than $123,200 to all political committees, with limits of $48,600 to candidates and $74,600 to political parties and PACs.
McCutcheon claimed, in error or falsely, that this was a grassroots victory against the status quo: “With the ruling, we continue to chip away at the long entrenched status quo from the grassroots—a status quo that has kept challengers, better ideas, and new entrants to the political arena mostly locked out. Ensuring that citizens are able to contribute to multiple candidates or causes who share their views only provides further support to a system in which ‘We the People’ hold the ultimate reins of power.”
This was an odd claim in 2014, given that it benefits most those wealthy enough to make such donations as opposed to the average citizen who lacks the funds to take advantage of this ruling. As I predicted in 2014, this ruling weakened what little grasp the people still have on the reins of power and strengthened the grip of the wealth. As I predicted, this ruling was a boon for the Republican party and billionaires as was evident by the billionaires attemnding Trump’s last inauguration. While it is true that the Democrats also have their wealthy supporters, the Democrats rely more heavily on large numbers of small donations.
Back in 2014 I was concerned the ruling would lead to increased corruption and increased influence on politics by the wealthy. On the face of it, these seem to be the obvious consequences of lifting such restrictions and allowing the money to flow more freely into politics. After all, the original purpose of the restrictions was to address problems with corruption and influence buying. It was an easy prediction to get right.
While those who supported it insisted that corruption and influence buying would not increase, they also appealed to the principle of freedom. As Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner said at the time, “What I think this means is freedom of speech is being upheld. Donors ought to have the freedom to give what they want to give.”
The basic issue, then, was and still is whether such spending is speech. That spending is free speech, seemed a dubious claim then and appears even more dubious now But let us reason through this. Suppose that spending money for political purposes should be considered speech. Now, it is acceptable to try to persuade a politician by speaking to them. If spending is speech, then I should be able to try to persuade politicians by speaking to them with money. However, this is bribery. But, if spending is a form of free speech, bribery should be acceptable as a form of free speech. This seems absurd, to say the least.
It might be countered that such contributions cannot be direct bribes in that there can be no direct giving of money in return for specific actions or promises to act. However, it would be foolish to believe campaign financing is not intended to influence behavior by providing money and support. After all, it would be ludicrous to imagine that millionaires and billionaires would donate millions of dollars and expect nothing in return. While this is not logically impossible, it is exceptionally unlikely. What has happened since 2014 has confirmed this repeatedly and the Trump regime has abandoned all pretense of not being a plutocracy. Although, to be fair and balanced, Trump’s approach is best seen as a griftocracy.
However, suppose spending is a form of speech and tprotected by the right of free expression. It does not, of course, follow that such speech should be free of limits. After all, limits are justly placed on speech. The example everyone uses is yelling of “fire” in a crowded theater in which there is no fire. In the case of allowing this sort of spending, it would do serious harm to the political process by increasing the influence of an individual based on his wealth and thus proportionally decreasing the influence of those who are less wealthy. To use an analogy, it is on par with having a public discussion in which the wealthy are allowed to blast their speech from concert grade loudspeakers up on a stage while the rest of us are expected to try to shout out our views from the crowd.
To counter arguments like this, Roberts made an analogy to newspaper endorsements. As he said, there is no limit to the number of candidates a newspaper can endorse. As such, by analogy, it should follow that there should be no limit on the number of candidates a person can donate money to. There are two easy and obvious replies I made back in 2014. The first is to go back to the original argument that spending is not speech. While a newspaper endorsement is speech (it is the expression of ideas and views) handing people money does not seem to qualify as an expression of ideas and views. When I buy a pair of running shoes or pay my entry to a road race, I am not engaged in expression—I am trading money for goods and services. Likewise, when a person donates to a political cause, they are trading money for goods and services. But, even if it is accepted that spending is speech, there is still a significant difference. A newspaper endorsement works by persuasion—one is either swayed by it or not. In contrast, large sums of money have far more impact: money allows people to become viable candidates, and it allows them to run campaigns. As such, the influence of money is much more significant than the influence of a newspaper endorsement and this increases the likelihood of corruption.
This returns to the corruption issue. My contention, back in 2014, was that such a flow of money would lead to corruption and grant the wealthy even more influence, while reducing the political influence of the less wealthy. The competing claim is that allowing this sort of spending will not have any negative impact. Given the usual effect of large sums of money, I would claim that increased corruption seems to be the likely outcome. Looking back twelve years after that 2014 decision, my predictions were proven correct; although that was one of the easiest predictions I ever made.