Get Money Out of Politics: The Push for a Constitutional Amendment

Thanks to the landmark Citizens United Supreme Court decision in early 2010, the US political landscape has changed forever... or at least for now. The Citizens United decision struck down campaign finance reform and opened the flood gates of secret campaign contributions by corporations and people.

Millions of dollars in donations from right-wing organizations like Karl Rove's American Crossroads fueled the Tea Party uprising in the fall 2010 elections, but that was just the beginning. The 2012 presidential race is the big enchilada. American Crossroads and its sister nonprofit Crossroads GPS announced that they plan to raise and spend $240 million in 2012, according to the Huffington Post.

Progressive Democrats of America has been fighting this corporate takeover of American government. Consequently, it was heartening to read a recent Huffington Post article about the push to pass a Constitutional Amendment to get money out of American politics.

Here is the proposed amendment...

"No person, corporation or business entity of any type, domestic or foreign, shall be allowed to contribute money, directly or indirectly, to any candidate for Federal office or to contribute money on behalf of or opposed to any type of campaign for Federal office. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, campaign contributions to candidates for Federal office shall not constitute speech of any kind as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution or any amendment to the U. S. Constitution. Congress shall set forth a federal holiday for the purposes of voting for candidates for Federal office."

Here is an excerpt from the Huffington Post article...

Money has bought our politics. Only we the people can take it back. But, HOW?

I have asked a professional lobbyist and a series of Constitutional scholars. They tell me that it will require a large, unrelenting, organized group aligned around a Constitutional Amendment to Get Money Out of politics.

So here is a draft of an Amendment and here is a petition to start the movement.

Read the Amendment and add your signature.

Our goal is to get a large, unrelenting, organized group to sign on to a petition asking our politicians to ban money in politics. If we can get it big enough, we can use my show on MSNBC as a platform to force this issue to the center of next year's Presidential debate. Without you I am just a talking head. With you we are 100,000 American s for Justice.

So join us, at GetMoneyOut.com

For the rest of the article, click here.

For more background about Get Money Out, click here.

Locally, watch for news and meetings related to PDA Tucson's Clean Elections and Corporate Personhood issue organizing teams.