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410  CITIZENS  UNITED  v.  FEDERAL  ELECTION  COMM’N 

Opinion of Stevens, J. 

of  these  ruminations  weakens  the  force  of  stare  decisis  es­
capes my comprehension.18 

The  majority  also  contends  that  the  Government’s  hesi­
tation  to  rely  on  Austin’s  antidistortion  rationale  “dimin­
ishe[s]” “the principle of adhering to that precedent.”  Ante, 
at 363; see also ante, at 382 (opinion of Roberts, C. J.) (Gov­
ernment’s litigating position is “most importan[t]” factor un­
dermining  Austin).  Why  it  diminishes  the  value  of  stare 
decisis  is  left  unexplained.  We  have  never  thought  ﬁt  to 
overrule a precedent because a litigant has taken any partic­
ular  tack.  Nor  should  we.  Our  decisions  can  often  be  de­
fended on multiple grounds, and a litigant may have strategic 
or  case-speciﬁc  reasons  for  emphasizing  only  a  subset  of 
them.  Members  of  the  public,  moreover,  often  rely  on  our 
bottom-line  holdings  far  more  than  our  precise  legal  argu­
ments; surely this is true for the legislatures that have been 
regulating corporate electioneering since Austin.  The task 
of  evaluating  the  continued  viability  of  precedents  falls  to 
this Court, not to the parties.19 

18 The  Chief  Justice  suggests  that  Austin  has  been  undermined  by 
subsequent  dissenting  opinions.  Ante,  at  380.  Under  this  view,  it  ap­
pears  that the  more times  the Court  stands  by a  precedent in  the  face of 
requests to overrule it, the weaker that precedent becomes.  The Chief 
Justice  further  suggests  that  Austin  “is  uniquely  destabilizing  because 
it  threatens  to  subvert  our  Court’s  decisions  even  outside”  its  particular 
facts,  as  when  we  applied  its  reasoning  in  McConnell.  Ante,  at  380. 
Once  again,  the theory  seems  to  be that  the  more  we utilize  a  precedent, 
the  more  we  call  it  into  question.  For  those  who  believe  Austin  was 
correctly  decided—as  the  Federal  Government  and  the  States  have  long 
believed,  as  the  majority  of  Justices  to  have  served  on  the  Court  since 
Austin  have  believed,  and  as  we  continue  to  believe—there  is  nothing 
“destabilizing” about the prospect of its continued application.  It is gut­
ting  campaign  ﬁnance  laws  across  the  country,  as  the  Court  does  today, 
that will be destabilizing. 

19 Additionally,  the  majority  cites  some  recent  scholarship  challenging 
the  historical  account  of  campaign  ﬁnance  law  given  in  United  States  v. 
Automobile Workers, 352 U. S. 567 (1957).  Ante, at 363–364.  Austin did 
not so much as allude to this historical account, much less rely on it.  Even