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344  CITIZENS  UNITED  v.  FEDERAL  ELECTION  COMM’N 

Opinion of the Court 

ture ban.  Id., at 155 (Rutledge, J., joined by Black, Douglas, 
and Murphy, JJ., concurring in result).  The concurrence ex­
plained  that  any  “ ‘undue  inﬂuence’ ”  generated  by  a  speak­
er’s  “large  expenditures”  was  outweighed  “by  the  loss  for 
democratic  processes  resulting  from  the  restrictions  upon 
free and full public discussion.”  Id., at 143. 

In  United  States  v.  Automobile  Workers,  352  U. S.  567 
(1957), the Court again encountered the independent expend­
iture ban, which had been recodiﬁed at 18 U. S. C. § 610 (1952 
ed.).  See 62 Stat. 723–724.  After holding only that a union 
television  broadcast  that  endorsed  candidates  was  covered 
by  the  statute,  the  Court  “[r]efus[ed]  to  anticipate  con­
stitutional  questions”  and  remanded  for  the  trial  to  pro­
ceed.  352  U. S.,  at  591.  Three  Justices  dissented,  arguing 
that  the  Court  should  have  reached  the  constitutional  ques­
tion  and  that  the  ban  on  independent  expenditures  was 
unconstitutional: 

“Under our Constitution it is We The People who are 
sovereign.  The  people  have  the  ﬁnal  say.  The  legis­
lators are their spokesmen.  The people determine 
through  their  votes  the  destiny  of  the  nation.  It  is 
therefore  important—vitally  important—that  all  chan­
nels  of  communication  be  open  to  them  during  every 
election,  that  no  point  of  view  be  restrained  or  barred, 
and  that  the  people  have  access  to  the  views  of  every 
group in  the community.”  Id., at  593 (opinion  of Doug­
las, J., joined by Warren, C. J., and Black, J.). 

The  dissent  concluded  that  deeming  a  particular  group  “too 
powerful”  was  not  a  “justiﬁcatio[n]  for  withholding  First 
Amendment  rights  from  any  group—labor  or  corporate.” 
Id.,  at  597.  The  Court  did  not  get  another  opportunity  to 
consider  the  constitutional  question  in  that  case;  for  after  a 
remand,  a  jury  found  the  defendants  not  guilty.  See  Hay­
ward, Revisiting the Fable of Reform, 45 Harv. J. Legis. 421, 
463 (2008).