Special interest groups sue for voice in race for Texas House speaker
February 14, 2008
Special-interest groups angling to play a role in the 2009 Texas speaker's race filed suit in Austin on Wednesday, saying a law that all but prohibits them from advocating for candidates for the top House post violates their free-speech rights.
Written by Emily Ramshaw, The Dallas Morning News
House Speaker Tom Craddick
AUSTIN – Special-interest groups angling to play a role in the 2009 Texas speaker's race filed suit in Austin on Wednesday, saying a law that all but prohibits them from advocating for candidates for the top House post violates their free-speech rights.
The lawsuit, which pairs unlikely bedfellows like the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, the Free Market Foundation and the Texas Eagle Forum, asks a judge for immediate relief – or at least relief in time for Texas' March 4 primary.
Under state law, organizations can't spend anything of value to aid or defeat a speaker candidate, including everything from direct contributions to producing campaign ads. Nor can they spend money to endorse other legislative candidates based on whom they've pledged to support for speaker – a position chosen by House members, and not by the voting public.
No one has ever been charged with breaking the law, punishable by up to $4,000 in fines and a year in jail.
"Threatening Texans with up to a year in jail for speaking about what legislators are doing is outrageous, and flatly unconstitutional," said Kelly Shackelford, president of the Free Market Foundation.
The idea behind the 1973 law wasn't to "muzzle free speech," said Jack Gullahorn, president and general counsel of the Professional Advocacy Association of Texas, which considers itself the ethics organization for lobbyists. It was that choosing a speaker should be a personal decision for lawmakers, not one fraught with the money and influence of a regular legislative campaign, he said. Many lobbyists still stand behind it.
The attorneys who filed Wednesday's suit say the statute prevents citizens from participating in the election of one of the state's most powerful figures. And they say they weren't inspired to take a hard look at the rules until last session, when attempts to oust Republican Tom Craddick took speaker politics to a new level.
Related Stories
Fair Use Notice
This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a "fair use" of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond "fair use", you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.