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PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   21812 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 28, 2024

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how is this legal? it seems like the legal theory is just add 'in minecraft' after the illegal act and then its ok. the people involved are very clearly receiving consideration for their vote as long as the 'in minecraft' clause was not added.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/597

Whoever makes or offers to make an expenditure to any person, either to vote or withhold his vote, or to vote for or against any candidate; and Whoever solicits, accepts, or receives any such expenditure in consideration of his vote or the withholding of his vote—

https://www.thefederalcriminalattorneys.com/expenditures-to-influence-voting

In simpler terms, this means it is illegal for anyone to use money or anything of value to influence someone's vote.

i'm going to solicit people to kill other people but make them check a box that says 'in minecraft' or 'this does not really create a legal agreement' and everything is ok.

ah: i missed the link that explains the courts have decided no money involved no problem:

https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2007/08/06/0655517.pdf

Whatever the wisdom of using vote-swapping agreements to communicate these positions, such agreements plainly differ from conventional (and illegal) vote buying, which conveys no message other than the parties’ willingness to exchange votes for money (or some other form of private profit). The Supreme Court held in Brown v. Hartlage, 456 U.S. 45, 55 (1982), that vote buying may be banned “without trenching on any right of association protected by the First Amendment.” Vote swapping, however, is more akin to the candidate’s pledge in Brown to take a pay cut if elected, which the Court concluded was constitutionally protected, than to unprotected vote buying. Like the candidate’s pledge, vote swapping involves a “promise to confer some ultimate benefit on the voter, qua . . . citizen[ ] or member of the general public” — i.e., another person’s agreement to vote for particular candidate. Id. at 58-59. And unlike vote buying, vote swapping is not an “illegal exchange for private profit” since the only benefit a vote swapper can receive is a marginally higher probability that his preferred electoral outcome will come to pass. Id. at 55 (emphasis added); cf. Marc John

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