First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti
E425635
First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti is a landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded First Amendment protections by recognizing corporations’ rights to spend money to influence ballot initiatives.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti canonical | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T4267663 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti Context triple: [United States Supreme Court cases of the Burger Court, hasNotableCase, First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti]
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A.
Cantwell v. Connecticut
Cantwell v. Connecticut is a 1940 U.S. Supreme Court case that first applied the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause to the states, striking down a state law that improperly restricted religious proselytizing.
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B.
Alden v. Maine
Alden v. Maine is a 1999 U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded state sovereign immunity by holding that states are generally immune from private suits for damages in their own courts under federal law.
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C.
Prince v. Massachusetts
Prince v. Massachusetts is a 1944 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld state authority to regulate child labor and limit children's religiously motivated activities in public for their protection.
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D.
McCullen v. Coakley
McCullen v. Coakley is a 2014 U.S. Supreme Court case that struck down Massachusetts’ abortion-clinic buffer zone law as violating the First Amendment’s free speech protections.
-
E.
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire is a 1942 U.S. Supreme Court case that established the "fighting words" doctrine, holding that certain personally abusive epithets are not protected by the First Amendment.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti Target entity description: First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti is a landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded First Amendment protections by recognizing corporations’ rights to spend money to influence ballot initiatives.
-
A.
Cantwell v. Connecticut
Cantwell v. Connecticut is a 1940 U.S. Supreme Court case that first applied the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause to the states, striking down a state law that improperly restricted religious proselytizing.
-
B.
Alden v. Maine
Alden v. Maine is a 1999 U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded state sovereign immunity by holding that states are generally immune from private suits for damages in their own courts under federal law.
-
C.
Prince v. Massachusetts
Prince v. Massachusetts is a 1944 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld state authority to regulate child labor and limit children's religiously motivated activities in public for their protection.
-
D.
McCullen v. Coakley
McCullen v. Coakley is a 2014 U.S. Supreme Court case that struck down Massachusetts’ abortion-clinic buffer zone law as violating the First Amendment’s free speech protections.
-
E.
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire is a 1942 U.S. Supreme Court case that established the "fighting words" doctrine, holding that certain personally abusive epithets are not protected by the First Amendment.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
United States Supreme Court case
ⓘ
landmark First Amendment case ⓘ |
| areaOfLaw |
constitutional law
ⓘ
corporate law ⓘ election law ⓘ |
| arguedDate | 1977-11-09 ⓘ |
| citation |
435 U.S. 765
ⓘ
55 L. Ed. 2d 707 ⓘ 98 S. Ct. 1407 ⓘ |
| concurrenceBy |
Potter Stewart
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Warren E. Burger NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| constitutionalProvisionAppliedToStatesBy | Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| constitutionalProvisionInterpreted | First Amendment to the United States Constitution NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| country |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| court | Supreme Court of the United States ⓘ |
| decisionDate | 1978-04-26 ⓘ |
| dissentBy |
Byron R. White
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Thurgood Marshall NERFINISHED ⓘ William H. Rehnquist NERFINISHED ⓘ William J. Brennan Jr. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| docketNumber | 76-1172 ⓘ |
| holding |
Corporations have a First Amendment right to attempt to influence the outcome of ballot initiatives through expenditures for political speech.
ⓘ
The First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting corporate independent expenditures related to ballot initiatives based on the corporate identity of the speaker. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| impact |
expanded First Amendment protections for corporate political speech
ⓘ
influenced later campaign finance jurisprudence ⓘ |
| joinedMajority |
Harry A. Blackmun
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Potter Stewart NERFINISHED ⓘ Warren E. Burger NERFINISHED ⓘ William H. Rehnquist (in part and dissenting in part) NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| jurisdiction |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| languageOfOpinion | English ⓘ |
| legalIssue |
First Amendment to the United States Constitution
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
campaign finance regulation ⓘ corporate political speech ⓘ freedom of speech ⓘ |
| majorityOpinionBy | Lewis F. Powell Jr. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| originatingJurisdiction | Massachusetts NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| petitioner | First National Bank of Boston NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| relatedCase |
Buckley v. Valeo
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| respondent | Francis X. Bellotti NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| respondentOffice | Attorney General of Massachusetts NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| result | Massachusetts statute declared unconstitutional as applied to corporate expenditures on ballot questions. ⓘ |
| stateLawChallenged | Massachusetts statute restricting corporate spending on ballot initiatives ⓘ |
| subjectMatter |
corporate expenditures in ballot measure campaigns
ⓘ
state regulation of corporate political activity ⓘ |
| yearDecided | 1978 ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti Description of subject: First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti is a landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded First Amendment protections by recognizing corporations’ rights to spend money to influence ballot initiatives.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
United States Supreme Court cases of the Burger Court
→
hasNotableCase
→
First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti
ⓘ