In a bitterly divided ruling, the Supreme Court voted today to overturn a long-standing precedent that banned corporations from giving sexual favors to lawmakers.
“The first amendment guarantees corporations the right to express themselves however they see fit, it guarantees free love,” said Chief Justice John Roberts, reading from the majority opinion. “If a corporation wants to ‘express’ itself to a senator or to members of the general public to ensure his election or to assist the passage of a bill, it would be unconstitutional for us to stand in its way.”
Justice Antonin Scalia, who agreed with the majority opinion, pointed out that sexual favors for Supreme Court justices also fell within the law.
Perhaps the most outspoken critic of the opinion was Justice Stevens. “The court’s blinkered and aphoristic approach to the First Amendment may well promote corporate power at the cost of the individual and collective self-expression. There were principled, narrower paths that a court that was serious about judicial restraint could have taken.”
Democrats expressed outrage at the ruling. Senator Harry Reid released a statement saying, “This ruling will give a small number of physically attractive interest groups an incredibly unfair advantage over the vast majority of Americans who are average-looking at best.”
The Supreme Court declined to elaborate on exactly what kind of corporate ‘donations’ were now permissible, but John Roberts hinted that “anything up to third base” was definitely protected by the Constitution.
