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The issue is not abortion. It is corporate power. For example, Janice Brown (California Supreme Court) wrote a dissent in Kasky v. Nike, Inc. (2002) 27 Cal.4th 939 in which she expressed her belief that corporations should pretty much have the same free speech rights as individuals and should not be required to tell the truth about their labor policies. She wants to give the big guys corporations the same free speech rights that little guy individuals enjoy under the First Amendment. That's a radical departure from existing Supreme Court precedent on this issue, and Brown, who is just a state supreme court justice, brashly criticizes the Supreme Court of the land on this issue. Here is a little of what she says. You can find this case on Findlaw -- California case law. Anyone can register for Findlaw, and it costs nothing.
Here is what she says:
Contrary to the majority's belief, our current First Amendment jurisprudence defies any simple solution. Under the commercial speech doctrine <27 Cal.4th 979> currently propounded by the United States Supreme Court, all speech is either commercial or noncommercial, and commercial speech receives less protection than noncommercial speech. ( Central Hudson Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Public Serv. Comm'n (1980) 447 U.S. 557, 562-563 <100 S.Ct. 2343, 2349-2350, 65 L.Ed.2d 341> ( Central Hudson ).) The doctrine further assumes that all commercial speech is the same under the First Amendment. Thus, all commercial speech receives the same level of lesser protection. The state may therefore ban all commercial speech "that is fraudulent or deceptive without further justification" ( Edenfield v. Fane (1993) 507 U.S. 761, 768 <113 S.Ct. 1792, 1798-1799, 123 L.Ed.2d 543>), but may not do the same to fraudulent or deceptive speech in " 'matters of public concern' " ( Dun & Bradstreet, Inc. v. Greenmoss Builders (1985) 472 U.S. 749, 758-759 <105 S.Ct. 2939, 2944-2945, 86 L.Ed.2d 593> (plur. opn. of Powell, J.) ( Dun & Bradstreet ), quoting First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978) 435 U.S. 765, 776 <98 S.Ct. 1407, 1415-1416, 55 L.Ed.2d 707> ( Bellotti )).
This simple categorization presupposes that commercial speech is wholly distinct from noncommercial speech and that all commercial speech has the same value under the First Amendment. The reality, however, is quite different. With the growth of commercialism, the politicization of commercial interests, and the increasing sophistication of commercial advertising over the past century, the gap between commercial and noncommercial speech is rapidly shrinking. As several commentators have observed, examples of the intersection between commercial speech and various forms of noncommercial speech, including scientific, political and religious speech, abound. (See, e.g., Kozinski & Banner, Who's Afraid of Commercial Speech , supra , 76 Va. L.Rev. at pp. 639-648; Redish, Product Health Claims and the First Amendment: Scientific Expression and the Twilight Zone of Commercial Speech (1990) 43 Vand. L.Rev. 1433, 1449-1454.) Indeed, the recent commissioning of a Fay Weldon novel by the jewelry company Bulgari as a marketing ploy highlights this blurring of commercial and noncommercial speech. (See Arnold, Making Books: Placed Products, and Their Cost , N.Y. Times (Sept. 13, 2001) p. E3, col. 1.)
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It goes from there (she is very longwinded), but you get the gist. States should not be controlling or regulating corporate speech. If Brown gets her way, corporations will take even more power over our lives, and we will have no recourse short of amending the U.S. Constitution.
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