> The debate is over reversing a corrupt and disastrous pre-trial
> ruling from over a century ago.
So are you saying that the Citizens United decision was only made on the basis of the headnote of Santa Clara, and if Santa Clara could be clarified, Citizens United must necessarily be overturned?
Because I think those two cases are orthogonal.
The real issue of Citizens United was that it overturned part of McCain-Feingold that said that corportations and unions can't run campaign ads. The opinion invoked the 1st Amendment. The Sanders proposal takes the correct position: to override Citizens United, you must ammend the constitution and specifically put Congress (back) in charge of who can and can't spend how much money on elections.
/jordan
ps-for-non-legal-junkies:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Clara_County_v._Southern_Pacific_Railroad http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission