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drekk | 4 months ago
A good instance where we might draw the line differently despite current first amendment norms is lobbying.
Lobbying, at its core, is just speech. Industry leaders and representatives go to meetings (public or private) to talk to congressmen. Thus lobbying has been affirmed as protected speech in our constitutional law
The problem is money changes access. And sure we can pursue contribution limits (which is generally constitutional) but lobbyists don't actually care about those -- they welcome the ability to save money. The problem is that they are just so well-connected their speech has disproportionate weight
So you could argue limiting their speech advances a compelling interest, but you'd have to think about other factors as well
It is just true that every liberty and right has limits, otherwise they could cut the public interest or other individual rights. This is true even in the US which orients itself as largely pro-speech sovereign relative to other states
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