Amended in Senate April 8, 2014

Amended in Senate March 28, 2014

Senate Bill No. 1272

Introduced by Senator Lieu

February 21, 2014

An act to submit an advisory question to the voters relating to campaign finance, calling an election, to take effect immediately.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

SB 1272, as amended, Lieu. Campaign finance: advisory election.

This bill would call a special election to be consolidated with the November begin delete 8, 2016 end delete begin insert 4, 2014 end insert , statewide general election. The bill would require the Secretary of State to submit to the voters at the November begin delete 8, 2016 end delete begin insert 4, 2014 end insert , consolidated election an advisory question asking whether the Congress of the United States should propose, and the California begin delete legislature end delete begin insert Legislature end insert should ratify, an amendment or amendments to the United States Constitution to overturn Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) 558 U.S. 310, and other applicable judicial precedents, as specified. The bill would require the Secretary of State to communicate the results of this election to the Congress of the United States.

This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an act calling an election.

Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

begin insert

begin insert SECTION 1. end insert   

end insert

begin insert This act shall be known and may be cited as the end insert begin insert Overturn Citizens United Act end insert begin insert . end insert

begin insert

begin insert SEC. 2. end insert   

end insert

begin insert The Legislature finds and declares all of the following: end insert

begin insert

(a) The United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights are
intended to protect the rights of individual human beings.

end insert begin insert

(b) Corporations are not mentioned in the United States
Constitution and the people have never granted constitutional
rights to corporations, nor have we decreed that corporations have
authority that exceeds the authority of “We the People.”

end insert begin insert

(c) In Connecticut General Life Insurance Company v. Johnson
(1938) 303 U.S. 77, United States Supreme Court Justice Hugo
Black stated in his dissent, “I do not believe the word ‘person’ in
the Fourteenth Amendment includes corporations.”

end insert begin insert

(d) In Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce (1990) 494
U.S. 652, the United States Supreme Court recognized the threat
to a republican form of government posed by “the corrosive and
distorting effects of immense aggregations of wealth that are
accumulated with the help of the corporate form and that have
little or no correlation to the public’s support for the corporation’s
political ideas.”

end insert begin insert

(e) In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010)
558 U.S. 310, the United States Supreme Court struck down limits
on electioneering communications that were upheld in McConnell
v. Federal Election Commission (2003) 540 U.S. 93 and Austin v.
Michigan Chamber of Commerce. This decision presents a serious
threat to self-government by rolling back previous bans on
corporate spending in the electoral process and allows unlimited
corporate spending to influence elections, candidate selection,
policy decisions, and public debate.

end insert begin insert

(f) In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, Justices
John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and
Sonia Sotomayor noted in their dissent that corporations have
special advantages not enjoyed by natural persons, such as limited
liability, perpetual life, and favorable treatment of the
accumulation and distribution of assets, that allow them to spend
huge sums on campaign messages that have little or no correlation
with the beliefs held by natural persons.

end insert begin insert

(g) Corporations have used the artificial rights bestowed upon
them by the courts to overturn democratically enacted laws that
municipal, state, and federal governments passed to curb corporate
abuses, thereby impairing local governments’ ability to protect
their citizens against corporate harms to the environment,
consumers, workers, independent businesses, and local and
regional economies.

end insert begin insert

(h) In Buckley v. Valeo (1976) 424 U.S. 1, the United States
Supreme Court held that the appearance of corruption justified
some contribution limitations, but it wrongly rejected other
fundamental interests that the citizens of California find
compelling, such as creating a level playing field and ensuring
that all citizens, regardless of wealth, have an opportunity to have
their political views heard.

end insert begin insert

(i) In First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978) 435 U.S.
765 and Citizens Against Rent Control/Coalition for Fair Housing
v. Berkeley (1981) 454 U.S. 290, the United States Supreme Court
rejected limits on contributions to ballot measure campaigns
because it concluded that these contributions posed no threat of
candidate corruption.

end insert begin insert

(j) In Nixon v. Shrink Missouri Government PAC (2000) 528
U.S. 377, United States Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens
observed in his concurrence that “money is property; it is not
speech.”

end insert begin insert

(k) A February 2010 Washington Post-ABC News poll found
that 80 percent of Americans oppose the ruling in Citizens United.

end insert begin insert

(l) Article V of the United States Constitution empowers and
obligates the people of the United States of America to use the
constitutional amendment process to correct those egregiously
wrong decisions of the United States Supreme Court that go to the
heart of our democracy and the republican form of
self-government.

end insert begin insert

(m) The people of California and of the United States have
previously used ballot measures as a way of instructing their
elected representatives about the express actions they want to see
them take on their behalf, including provisions to amend the United
States Constitution.

end insert

begin delete SECTION 1. end delete
begin insert SEC. 3. end insert   

A special election is hereby called to be held
throughout the state on November begin delete 8, 2016 end delete begin insert 4, 2014 end insert . The special
election shall be consolidated with the statewide general election
to be held on that date. The consolidated election shall be held and
conducted in all respects as if there were only one election and
only one form of ballot shall be used.

begin delete SEC. 2. end delete
begin insert SEC. 4. end insert   

(a) Notwithstanding Section 9040 of the Elections
Code, the Secretary of State shall submit the following advisory
question to the voters at the November begin delete 8, 2016 end delete begin insert 4, 2014 end insert ,
consolidated election:

“Shall the Congress of the United States propose, and the
California begin delete legislature end delete begin insert Legislature end insert ratify, an amendment or
amendments to the United States Constitution to overturn Citizens
United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) 558 U.S. 310, and
other applicable judicial precedents, to allow the full regulation
or limitation of campaign contributions and spending, to ensure
that all citizens, regardless of wealth, may express their views to
one another, and to make clear that the rights protected by the
United States Constitution are the rights of natural persons only?”

(b) Upon certification of the election, the Secretary of State
shall communicate to the Congress of the United States begin delete Congress end delete
the results of the election asking the question set forth in
subdivision (a).

(c) The provisions of the Elections Code that apply to the
preparation of ballot measures and ballot materials at a statewide
election apply to the measure submitted pursuant to this section.

begin delete SEC. 3. end delete
begin insert SEC. 5. end insert   

This act calls an election within the meaning of Article
IV of the Constitution and shall go into immediate effect.