Expert: Michael Troy - 3/2/2006

Question
Hi, I am in a Political Science class at the junior college MJC.Which I am having much difficulty in, as the area is so foreign to me.  I am reseaching the Randall v. Sorrell case, the question I need to answer is--Do Vermont's mandatory limits on political campaign contributions and political campaign spending violate the 1st Amendment?  I am ok so far with proving the contribution part,,however I need help on the spending area,,see I am playing the role in simulation as an attorney representing Randall and arguing that Vermont's Act 64 is unconstitutional because it violates freedom of speech.  So I need to tie  the spending into the freespeech.  ANY HELP at all in this would be so much appreciated,, as I am truely lost PLESAE help....THANK-YOU  LISA

Answer
Hi Lisa,

The Supreme Court has held quite clearly and consistently in a number of important cases that any limits on campaign spending violates the First Amendment.  The argument is basically this:

Protecting political debate is a key purpose of the First Amendment.  Any law that hinders a candidate's ability to get his or her message out to the voters is a restriction on his or her right to free expression.  Limits on contributions are acceptable within limits because the government has an interest in preventing corruption or the appearance of corruption.  However, there is no such justification on spending limits because if a candidate has lots of money, that only means either a lot of people support the candidate with the limited contributions, or the candidate is using his/her own money.  Since you cannot bribe yourself, the corruption argument does not work there.

The Case which first really laid out this reasoning was Buckley v. Valeo, 424 US 1 (1976).

You can read the whole opinion here:

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=us&vol=424&pag...

But since the opinion is 295 pages long, you might be interested in just a summary like the one here:

http://www.campaignfinancesite.org/court/buckley1.html

Depending on how much reading you want to do, the Federal Election Commission has a list of the key cases involving contribution and expenditure limits here:

http://www.fec.gov/law/litigation_CCA_Subject.shtml#C

(scroll about half way down the screen until you get to the title "Contribution and Expenditure Limits"

I know this is all rather complicated and dry reading, so if you have any further questions, feel free to send a follow-up.

- Mike