By Buddy Nevins, BrowardBeat.com, Special to EyesOnNews.com, Jan 20, 2015 – An e-mail soliciting money for judicial candidate Michael Lynch hit inboxes last week.
Two former judges and not Lynch signed the request because Florida Bar rules forbid judicial candidates from soliciting money for themselves.
The legality of that decades-old Bar ban and whether it’s a violation of First Amendment rights of free speech will be argued at the U. S. Supreme Court today.
A decision is due by June and the outcome is uncertain. It should be remembered that the current court already has equated money with free speech in the noted Citizens United vs. Federal Elections Commission campaign spending case in 2010.
The case this week is Williams-Yulee v. Florida Bar.
In September 2009, Tampa lawyer Lanell Williams-Yulee asked for “$20, $50, $100, $250 or $500” for her county court campaign in a mass mailing. She was reprimanded and fined $1,860 by the Florida Bar for violating the rules of judicial campaigns. She challenged the rules, but lost all the way to the Florida Supreme Court.
