3 October 2016
Caron Cooper inadvertently strengthens the
First Amendment rights of political bloggers
Seven days ago, exercised by an 18 August 2016 post at the Montana Cowgirl blog, independent Public Service Commission candidate Caron Cooper set out to teach Cowgirl a lesson in manners. She filed a complaint with Montana’s Commissioner of Political Practices accusing Montana Cowgirl of violating MCA 13-35-225 Election materials not to be anonymous.
Five days later, Cooper’s complaint was dismissed in a powerful decision that cites McIntyre v. Ohio, and leaves no doubt that anonymous political blogging is constitutionally protected free speech. Why Cooper might have expected any other outcome is a head scratcher.
Saturday, Cowgirl reacted to MTCOPP’s decision. Yesterday, in that post’s comment thread, Cooper reacted to Cowgirl. Also yesterday, Pete Talbot at Intelligent Discontent commented on MTCOPP’s decision (as well as on the PSC District 3 election). And at Reptile Dysfunction, William Skink called the MTCOPP’s decision a victory for free speech.
The place to settle political disputes — and that’s what this was and is — is in the marketplace of ideas, in the public discourse of a campaign, not in MTCOPP’s office. Although Cowgirl administered a bruising cudgeling to Cooper in that 18 August post, Cowgirl also ran on 5 April a guest post by Cooper, when Cooper was still a candidate for the Democratic nomination for PSC District 3, that criticized her opponent, Rep. Pat Noonan.
What ill disposes Cowgirl and the Democratic Party’s establishment toward Cooper is Cooper’s decision to withdraw from the Democratic primary, which she feared Noonan would win, and file as an independent candidate. Although Cooper had the right to bypass the Democrat primary, and proved she had political support by gathering thousands of signatures to qualify as an independent candidate, I wish she would have stayed in the Democratic primary, where she might have done better than she expected. Democrats are concerned, with good reason, that on 8 November Cooper and Noonan will split the progressive vote, allowing incumbent Republican Roger Koopman to win with a plurality.
(If Montana had an instant runoff voting system, that kind of perverse outcome would not be a concern.)
Of course, Koopman could win with a majority. In 2012, he won 11 of PSC District 3’s 14 counties. Changes in voter registration since then probably favor Koopman. If the election were held today, and he received in each county the same fraction of registered voters as in 2012, he would increase his margin of victory slightly.
Campaign finance reports are due this week, and will provide a measure of how vigorously and well Cooper, Koopman, and Noonan, are prosecuting their campaigns.