End corporate money in politics

by Toddy Perryman, Hamilton

There is a proposal for a constitutional initiative to eliminate corporate money from Montana politics. The Transparent Election Initiative (TEI), led by Jeff Mangan, (former MT Commissioner of Political Practices) aims to challenge the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which permits unlimited corporate campaign contributions. They seek to address common questions about corporate influence in elections with this initiative.  

The Montana Plan, TEI’s proposed initiative, intends to modify Montana’s corporate charters. These charters are the legal agreements that permit businesses to operate within the state. The initiative would explicitly prohibit both new and existing corporations from contributing to political campaigns. Consequently, any out-of-state companies operating in Montana would need to comply with this regulation, restricting entities from channeling money within the state for political purposes.  

Montana has a long history of standing up to corporate power. Its Corrupt Practices Act of 1912, enacted after a bruising era of copper-king dominance, stood for a century before being overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in American Tradition Partnership v. Bullock, a summary reversal applying Citizens United.

“For over a century, Montana’s Corrupt Practices Act ensured elections were about people, not unlimited corporate spending and control,” says former Montana Gov. Steve Bullock (D), the defendant in that case. “When the Supreme Court discarded Montana’s history after Citizens United, the Court tied our hands. The Montana Plan unties them—by letting Montanans decide what corporations have the power to do in our state. This honors our history of fair play and returns the power back to the voters, where it belongs.”

Montana never lost its power to define the legal characteristics of the corporations it creates. And unlike in Bullock, this initiative does not regulate campaign finance. It declines to grant a corporate power. That places it outside the bounds of Citizens United entirely.

Every state in the nation holds the same underlying authority Montana holds. Some allow direct initiatives, others do not, but the legal foundation exists everywhere. Once a few states reclaim their sovereign power over corporations, the spell will break, and Americans in every state will be able to see that the corporations they create do, in fact, answer to them, and that the people need not let their creations destroy their democracy.

Montanans don’t wait for Washington to fix what’s broken. If you agree, keep an eye out for petition signature gatherers and put your name to this idea. This is a non-partisan issue with support from all sides (except the corporate overlords.)

This initiative has been reported in the Montana Free Press and there is a more substantive discussion of it in the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, including a link to the proposed initiative (from which I have shamelessly plagiarized for this letter.)