For a lesson in what happens when legislators toy with First Amendment rights, stop by state Supreme Court tomorrow. Lawyers for a City Council member, Annabel Palma, will be before Judge Paul Feinman accusing the city’s Campaign Finance Board of having “unconstitutionally vague” laws and of infringing upon “rights of speech and association protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments,” while the Board will deny the accusations.

As our Alec Magnet reported yesterday, Ms. Palma’s challenge stems from the board’s investigation into whether her 2003 campaign violated the board’s coordination and single source rules on campaign contributions. The board could levy more than $100,000 in penalties against Ms. Palma.

The executive director of the Campaign Finance Board, Nicole Gordon, told the Sun that its rules were “quite clear” and were “not limiting” to individuals, who were free to spend as much as they wanted on their own, but only limiting to those who voluntarily signed with up their program. Ms. Gordon told the Sun that “if you believe in limits, and they are constitutional, if you have a candidate directing a third party,” then the candidate is “really getting value beyond the contribution limit.” A spokesman for the board, Andrea Lynn, said the single source rule exists “to prevent circumvention of the contribution limits.”

This case holds a big lesson for our legislators. It highlights the danger of allowing campaign finance rules that hamper First Amendment rights. Our reading of the First Amendment – “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech” forbids our legislators from, yes, abridging speech. Money enables people to inform others of their views and so any limits on spending would appear to be unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court disagreed when, in 2003, it upheld the McCain-Feingold law – but there is hope that a new Court, with Chief Justice Roberts, and we hope soon to be, Judge Alito, will correct this. McCain-Feingold also failed anyway in its aim – big money simply found its way back into politics through a different method: the so-called 527 groups.

A bill sponsored by Bill de Blasio and supported by Ms. Palma that is currently before the Council would loosen or “clarify” the single source rules. Mr. de Blasio, like Ms. Palma, discovered the downside of allowing campaign finance rules to remain on the books when his 2003 campaign was fined for violating the single source rules. It’s nice to see the city’s legislators beginning to discover the faults of campaign finance regulation, even if they had to learn the hard way.