David Broder has a column in today’s Washington Post that appears to be a rousing defense of the Supreme Court’s decision restricting the reach of McCain-Feingold, but then he demonstrates clearly that he really doesn’t understand what freedom of speech is all about.

He starts out with some well-deserved criticism of the Mainstream Media’s reaction to the decision:

The decision was greeted with derision. The New York Times said “it opened a big new loophole in time to do mischief in the 2008 elections.” The Post said that while the ad seems “inoffensive” on its face, the ruling “reopens a dangerous loophole.” The Reform Institute said it “paves the way for the return of sham ‘issue ads’ just as the 2008 campaign is heating up.” Have we completely lost our bearings? This is no “loophole,” folks. This is pretty basic. I agree completely with Matt Notowidigdo, who wrote to the Times, as “someone who is passionately pro-choice,” that he cheered the ruling for the anti-abortion group. “While that organization might technically fit under the definition of a ‘corporation’ for the purposes of campaign finance law,” he wrote, “I have trouble understanding how that organization’s involvement in the late stages of a campaign represents an excessive influence of ‘special interests’ . . . . “The organization clearly represents the views of a very large number of citizens. The many citizens who contribute time and money to Wisconsin Right to Life care deeply about issues related to abortion, and I think that it is a clear victory for political speech that they can now collectively express themselves when their message has the greatest impact.”

He even makes the point that so-called election law reformers simply don’t understand the issues that are at stake when they attempt to restrict private funding of campaigns:

The reality that reformers find hard to accept is that in this country, efforts to regulate tightly the flow of money from the private sector to the political world will almost always run afoul of the courts. The effect of much over-regulation is not to shut down the spigots but to drive donors farther and farther underground.

But then, as is usually the case for inside-the beltway types like Broder, he goes horribly, horribly wrong:

Two approaches remain open. A carefully drafted constitutional amendment could certify Congress’s right to some form of campaign finance regulation. More realistically, a system of public finance — taxpayer-subsidized campaigns — would enable candidates to cope with the inevitable intrusion of outside voices into their races.

It takes a moment to understand the implications of what Broder is talking about here. Even back in its 1976 decision that permitted limits on campaign contributions, Buckley v. Valeo, the Supreme Court has recognized that campaign contributions and political activism on behalf of a candidate are, at some fundamental level, activities that are protected by the First Amendment. This was recognized even more forcefully in the decisions the Court handed down last week.

To the extent that the Court has allowed regulation of campaign finance, it has balanced the rights of the individual with the supposed interest of the state to regulate elections. Many, including myself, would argue that the Court has gone too far in allowing the state to interfere with the ability of citizens to exercise their First Amendment rights with respect to supporting the candidate of their choice. But the Court still recognizes that regulating campaign contributions in any respect implicates the First Amendment.

What Broder suggests, basically, is something that has not been done in the 216 years since the Bill of Rights was ratified. He suggests that we amend the First Amendment. That we limit Freedom of Speech. And that, ultimately, we violate the rights of every citizen by forcing them, through taxation, to contribute to the campaigns of candidates they don’t agree with.

Quite honestly, I can’t think of anything that would be more un-American.