Court Opinion

ID: 9669844
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:09:57.63165+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:42:43.845176
License: Public Domain

*683WILLIAM A. BABLITCH, J.
¶ 37. (concurring). Nobody, including the Elections Board, is attempting to stop WMC from saying anything they want to say during the election season. What is at stake here is whether the public has a right to know who is paying for whatever it is WMC wants to say during the election season.
¶ 38. The spin surrounding this case has been that the Elections Board is trying to stifle free speech. Not true. It's all about the public, knowing who is saying what.
¶ 39. An informed electorate is essential to a healthy democracy. If people are told that a Ford is a great car, it is important for people to know whether Consumer Reports or Ford is saying so. Similarly, if the electorate is being told that a candidate is a great friend of education, it is important for people to know whether the teachers union or Common Cause is saying so. The answer to "Who paid?" answers a lot of questions.
¶ 40. That is what is at stake here, and no amount of spin should be able to hide that fact.
¶ 41. Having said the above, I join the majority opinion. I agree that WMC should be dismissed from the case for lack of notice regarding what constitutes "express advocacy." I would have preferred that a majority could have found its way to expressing a standard by declaring that, in the future, ads such as these constitute "express advocacy." I would have joined that result.
¶ 42. Nevertheless, a half loaf in this instance is far better than no loaf at all. The dissent presents a well reasoned and persuasive case as to why these ads constitute "express advocacy." Does the dissent express *684an acceptable standard? For me, yes. Are there the votes for it? No.
¶ 43. If I joined the dissent, the result would be a 3-3 vote. Guidance is needed and a tie vote does not provide guidance. A tie vote results in no opinion and therefore no standard or guidance from this court on the very issue that needs resolution. Because there is at present no appellate decision on the issue, we would have to remand to the court of appeals for their decision, then consider yet another appeal. Meanwhile, at least one or more election cycles would come and go. Wisconsin would continue to have no standard as to what constitutes "express advocacy." The legislature and the Elections Board, as well as potential advocates such as the Wisconsin Manufacturers Association, would be left completely in the dark as to whether ads that do not contain any "magic words" can be regulated. Drafters of a standard would not know whether they should even consider a context based approach.
¶ 44. The majority opinion, despite the words of the dissent, does provide some needed guidance. It does not provide all the guidance the dissent wants, but in this instance some guidance is better than none.1
*685¶ 45. By my joining the majority, the legislature or the elections board is now free to craft a standard for "express advocacy," knowing that at the least there is no requirement for "magic words," and that the court will consider as an alternative a context based approach. I invite one or the other or both to craft a standard.. .posthaste.

 I would have preferred a decision that more closely echoed the dissent in some respects, but that it is not to say that the majority opinion voices a decision with which I disagree. It is of utmost importance to provide guidance in this case, which the majority does effectively, and does correctly. That is why I join it. It does not go as far as I would prefer, but most judges have joined opinions that go a bit farther or less far than we would like. See Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954). See also Daniel A. Farber, et al., Constitutional Law: Themes from the Constitution's Third Century 50-52 (1993); Leo Katcher, Earl Warren, A Political Biography (1967).
*685Judicial decision-making necessarily involves a variety of choices. Would that the best choice be always clear, but it is not. Some choices may, at first blush, appear to be preferable, but, looked at it in the perspective of the whole, are not. That is what happened here. I compromised. Most appellate judges do. Sometimes the best choice, for a variety of reasons, is not one's first choice.
Judicial opinions are filled with compromise, and we should not deny it. As Benjamin Cardozo said, judges "do not stand aloof on chill and distant heights; and we shall not help the cause of truth by acting and speaking as if they do."