"Did Laurence Tribe Sell Out?"

Asks lawprof Tim Wu in The New Yorker. Key paragraph:

How you feel about this work probably depends on how you feel about the use of the Constitution as an anti-regulatory tool and the idea of corporations as constitutional �persons.� Tribe has taken a strong view of individual rights; his view of corporate rights is similar, and in this capacity he has at times advanced constitutional arguments that might invalidate great parts of the administrative state, in a manner recalling the Supreme Court�s jurisprudence of the nineteen-twenties and thirties. In that sense, the current condemnation of Tribe can be seen as part of a larger progressive backlash against the use of the Bill of Rights to serve corporate interests.

"Liberals used to love the First Amendment."

"But that was in an era when courts used it mostly to protect powerless people like civil rights activists and war protesters," writes Adam Liptak in The New York Times.

�Corporations have begun to displace individuals as the direct beneficiaries of the First Amendment,� Professor Coates wrote. The trend, he added, is �recent but accelerating.�

Hmm. I don't know. In conlaw class, I was just teaching the great 1964 landmark case � that loved-by-liberals case � New York Times v. Sullivan. But, fortunately, I've got The New York Times to set me straight. Corporations are not people.

Okay. Thanks to Adam Liptak, a man I'm noticing only because the corporate platform of The New York Times elevates him high above all the poor and puny anonymities....

And I'm fascinated by this notion that the Constitution ought to mean what would make liberals love it. Hey, Supreme Court, why don't you make the Constitution lovable again? We used to love you, First Amendment, but you changed.

Ironically, back when Liptak's liberals loved the First Amendment, a big deal was always made about how it protects the speech you hate. That was the challenge, to love the freedom itself. Seems like you changed.