Credit: Nation of Change

Earlier this month, the United States came one step closer to enacting its first constitutional amendment in 24 years.

A bipartisan majority of New York’s Senate and Assembly issued letters to Congress on June 15 calling for a 28th amendment. Both Republican and Democratic versions of the letter demand the new amendment say that corporations “are not entitled to the same rights and protections as natural persons under the Constitution,” which moves the country toward overturning the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United.

That decision has resulted in a great expansion of “outside spending,” meaning spending by political action committees and nonprofits rather than by candidates’ own campaigns. In the first four years after Citizens United was passed, outside spending on Senate races nationwide more than doubled to $486 million. Across all campaigns, super PACs have spent more than $1 billion on races since 2010, with more than 60 percent of that amount coming from fewer than 200 individuals and married couples.This month’s letters make New York the 17th state to call for […]