Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/13pdf/12-536_e1pf.pdf
Page Number: 17.0

Cite as:  572 U. S. ____ (2014) 

11 

Opinion of ROBERTS, C. J. 

base limit.  Id., at 38.  The Court determined that circum-
vention could occur when an individual legally contributes
“massive  amounts  of  money  to  a  particular  candidate
through the use of unearmarked contributions” to entities
that  are  themselves  likely  to  contribute  to  the  candidate. 
Ibid.  For  that  reason,  the  Court  upheld  the  $25,000  ag-
gregate limit.

Although  Buckley  provides  some  guidance,  we  think
that  its  ultimate  conclusion  about  the  constitutionality  of
the aggregate limit in place under FECA does not control 
here.  Buckley  spent  a  total  of  three  sentences  analyzing 
that limit; in fact, the opinion pointed out that the consti-
tutionality of the aggregate limit “ha[d] not been separately 
addressed  at  length  by  the  parties.”    Ibid.  We  are  now 
asked to address appellants’ direct challenge to the aggre-
gate  limits  in  place  under  BCRA.   BCRA  is  a  different 
statutory  regime,  and  the  aggregate  limits  it  imposes 
operate against a distinct legal backdrop.

Most  notably,  statutory  safeguards  against  circumven-
tion  have  been  considerably  strengthened  since  Buckley
was  decided,  through  both  statutory  additions  and  the 
introduction of a comprehensive regulatory scheme.  With 
more targeted anticircumvention measures in place today,
the  indiscriminate  aggregate  limits  under  BCRA  appear 
particularly heavy-handed.

The  1976  FECA  Amendments,  for  example,  added  an-
other  layer  of  base  contribution  limits.    The  1974  version 
of  FECA  had  already  capped  contributions  from  political
committees  to  candidates,  but  the  1976  version  added 
limits  on  contributions  to  political  committees.  This 
change was enacted at least “in part to prevent circumven-
tion  of  the  very  limitations  on  contributions  that  this 
Court  upheld  in  Buckley.”  California  Medical  Assn.  v. 
Federal  Election  Comm’n,  453  U. S.  182,  197–198  (1981) 
(plurality  opinion);  see  also  id.,  at  203  (Blackmun,  J.,
concurring in part and concurring in judgment).  Because