By John McCarthy
The Associated Press

COLUMBUS - Ohio Supreme Court Justice Alice Robie Resnick is happy the Ohio Elections Commission has found that the ads a business group ran attacking her in the 2000 re-election campaign violated Ohio campaign law.

Now she wants the courts to uphold the commission's ruling.

"This is probably where it will get resolved.

"Maybe we can bring some sense of dignity back to elections," Resnick said Thursday after the commission ruled 4-3 that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce violated an Ohio law that prohibits direct spending of corporate money on political ads.

Common Cause/Ohio had argued in its complaint that the chamber's ads crossed the line that forbids outside groups from explicitly calling for the election or defeat of a specific candidate.

The chamber's violation carries a $1,000 fine, but it won't be collected while the case is in court.

The chamber said it would appeal the agency's ruling in court.

The chamber also is eager to resolve the issue of whether a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Buckley v. Valeo, shields outside groups from disclosure if they run ads that don't directly urge the election or defeat of a candidate.

As part of a deal the chamber reached with Common Cause before Thursday's hearing, the chamber will not have to disclose its donors.

Resnick said they should be forced to do so.

"If those corporations had to be disclosed, I think they would think twice. Their stockholders would not like the fact that they are involved in these decisions to influence elections," Resnick said.

The ruling also could affect a complaint filed by the Alliance for Democracy against the Ohio Chamber of Commerce-backed group known as Citizens for a Strong Ohio. That group spent $4 million on ads attacking Resnick. The commission has scheduled a hearing in that case for July.

Ohio law states that corporations, labor unions and other groups cannot directly spend money "for or in aid of or opposition to a political party, a candidate for election ... or for any partisan political purpose."

One of the ads in question depicted someone dumping bags of money on Resnick's desk and implied that she switched her vote on a 1991 case after a contributor complained.

Another ad compared the credentials of Republican Justice Deborah Cook, who was also on the 2000 ballot, with those of Democrat Tim Black.