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Rather than just relying on what you think, you would need to propose a legal framework that can actually be enforced, for distinguishing between the two. Becau

Rather than just relying on what you think, you would need to propose a legal framework that can actually be enforced, for distinguishing between the two. Because it is legally ambiguous. Because if your framework becomes "non-profit that publicly reports spending is okay," what's to stop a billionaire from donating millions to their own non-profit, governed by a bunch of their "elected" friends (membership fee = $1M)? Now you can expect a bunch of lawsuits over that question!

CPLX 10y ago
That would be fine. The hypothetical billionaire non-profit would have disclosure rules, and the judge could determine if their charter was sufficiently related to be able to weigh in. This isn't actually all that complicated, we do it for amicus filings all the time.
- argonaut 10y ago
  And if the judge determines the charter is unrelated, for example, you can expect a never-ending series of appeals over that judicial decision. That's just one example.
acdha 10y ago
I keep coming back to a very simple policy: disclosure. When the ACLU pays for lawyers, it's not a secret and e.g. a judge, government official, etc. making decisions about the case does so with full knowledge of who's backing it. As with campaign finance, this has two benefits: it avoids trying to enumerate all of the ways someone might try to game the system and it addresses free speech concerns by simply requiring attribution in an area where there's a strong public interest.
- selimthegrim 10y ago
  Oh really, so then you'd be OK with throwing out the case law for cases like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Button https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Button and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Alabama https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Alabama?
  - acdha 10y ago
    In neither case was the NAACP's involvement concealed so I assume you're switching to the question of whether this goes more than one level deep to include the membership lists. That's a good question – it would be interesting to see how a modern court would rule on something like setting minimum thresholds, or how many more options a state-level attacker has now to build that kind of list without permission.

CPLX 10y ago

That would be fine. The hypothetical billionaire non-profit would have disclosure rules, and the judge could determine if their charter was sufficiently related to be able to weigh in. This isn't actually all that complicated, we do it for amicus filings all the time.

argonaut 10y ago
And if the judge determines the charter is unrelated, for example, you can expect a never-ending series of appeals over that judicial decision. That's just one example.

acdha 10y ago

I keep coming back to a very simple policy: disclosure. When the ACLU pays for lawyers, it's not a secret and e.g. a judge, government official, etc. making decisions about the case does so with full knowledge of who's backing it. As with campaign finance, this has two benefits: it avoids trying to enumerate all of the ways someone might try to game the system and it addresses free speech concerns by simply requiring attribution in an area where there's a strong public interest.

selimthegrim 10y ago
Oh really, so then you'd be OK with throwing out the case law for cases like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Button https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Button and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Alabama https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAACP_v._Alabama?
- acdha 10y ago
  In neither case was the NAACP's involvement concealed so I assume you're switching to the question of whether this goes more than one level deep to include the membership lists. That's a good question – it would be interesting to see how a modern court would rule on something like setting minimum thresholds, or how many more options a state-level attacker has now to build that kind of list without permission.