Re: Electionlawblog news and commentary 9/29/05

"Daniel Weintraub: How Prop. 77 would boost political competition"

"Louisiana Political Storm Brewing"

Roll Call offers this fascinating report (paid subscription required). So far I have seen very little talk about how expected shifts in population could make Louisiana a more solid Republican state, with national implications for Congress.

The New York Times, Chief Justice Roberts, and the Vermont Campaign Finance Limits Case

The position of the New York Times editorial board on the two campaign finance cases the Supreme Court will hear is unsurprising; the board has been a big supporter of the constitutionality of campaign finance regulation. But I was struck by this passage in today's editorial:

[The Vermont case] may be one of the first indications of what kind of chief justice John Roberts will be. At his confirmation hearings, he expressed his commitment to "judicial modesty" and his respect for established precedent. If he is true to those principles, deference to Vermont's Legislature and respect for Buckley should lead him to resist any entreaties by Justices Scalia and Thomas to dismantle the campaign finance law.
The point about deference to the legislature is fine (though I have my own views on when such deference is appropriate that I've written about in detail elsewhere). But to say that respect for Buckley v. Valeo should lead the new Chief to uphold spending limits applied to candidates is ludicrious. If the judge wishes to respect precedent, he should vote to strike down the spending limits. Buckley held that candidate spending limits are unconstitutional, and it would take a change in the law to uphold the Vermont limits. We can debate whether such a change is warranted; but it is incorrect to view Buckley the way the Times editorial does.
The real argument for respecting established precedent, and the real test of the new Chief Justice, as I have written, will come in the Wisconsin case. Suppose (as I think is a reasonable assumption) the new Chief believes limits on spending by corporations and unions in elections violate the First Amendment. Does he vote then to overrule the 1990 Austin case and the 2003 McConnell (McCain-Feingold) case to reach this result?

Andrew Young on Carter-Baker

See this letter to the editor in the New York Times. Meanwhile, Spencer Overton's Roll Call oped on Carter-Baker is available without a subscription here.

"Court to revisit campaign-finance debate"

Tony Mauro offers this analysis for the First Amendment Center.

Interesting Articles in Public Choice on the Electoral College, Voting Technology and the Elderly, and Problems of Voting

You can find the table of contents here.

John Bonifaz is Wildly Over-optimistic (at least in Public) About His Chances of Getting the Supreme Court to Accept the Constitutionality of Spending Limits

See here. Justice Kennedy? No chance.

Fuentes-Rohwer on the VRA

Luis Fuentes-Rohwer has posted Staring Down the Revolution: On Federalism, Congressional Powers, and the Upcoming Extension of the Voting Rights Act on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

In enacting the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Congress sought to overcome decades of neglect and outright refusal to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment. Well aware of the severe nature of the means chosen to accomplish this worthy end, Congress put a five year termination date to its coverage formula under the Act. Yet extensions soon followed, to the point that these temporary provisions have become for all intents and purposes permanent features of the American political landscape. This is a significant development, for these intrusive federal requirements were initially justified as, inter alia, temporary measures. We can pretend no longer. And as a result, the Supreme Court will face what promises to be the stiffest challenge to its federalism revolution of late. If the federalism revolution means anything, the Court must strike down a new extension of the Act. But, as this Essay concludes, the Court will not have the will to overturn one of the crown jewels of the civil rights movement. This will be a momentous occasion, for it will offer further proof that the Court knows when to pick a fight and when to back off.

-- 
Rick Hasen 
William H. Hannon Distinguished Professor of Law
Loyola Law School 
919 Albany Street 
Los Angeles, CA  90015-1211 
(213)736-1466 - voice 
(213)380-3769 - fax 
rick.hasen@lls.edu 
http://www.lls.edu/academics/faculty/hasen.html 
http://electionlawblog.org