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468  CITIZENS  UNITED  v.  FEDERAL  ELECTION  COMM’N 

Opinion of Stevens, J. 

parties”  makes  pellucidly  clear.  McConnell,  540  U. S.,  at 
148.  “[C]orporate  participation”  in  elections,  any  business 
executive  will  tell  you,  “is  more  transactional  than  ideologi­
cal.”  Supp. Brief for Committee for Economic Development 
as Amicus Curiae 10. 

In  this  transactional  spirit,  some  corporations  have  af­
ﬁrmatively  urged  Congress  to  place limits  on  their  election­
eering  communications.  These  corporations  fear  that  of­
ﬁceholders  will  shake  them  down  for  supportive  ads,  that 
they  will  have  to  spend  increasing  sums  on  elections  in  an 
ever-escalating  arms  race  with  their  competitors,  and  that 
public  trust  in  business  will  be  eroded.  See  id.,  at  10–19. 
A  system  that  effectively  forces  corporations  to  use  their 
shareholders’ money both to maintain access to, and to avoid 
retribution from, elected ofﬁcials may ultimately prove more 
harmful than beneﬁcial to many corporations.  It can impose 
a kind of implicit tax.73 

In  short,  regulations  such  as  § 203  and  the  statute  upheld 
in Austin impose only a limited burden on First Amendment 
freedoms  not  only  because  they  target  a  narrow  subset  of 
expenditures  and  leave  untouched  the  broader  “public  dia­
logue,”  ante,  at  341,  but  also  because  they  leave  untouched 

73 Not all corporations support BCRA § 203, of course, and not all corpo­
rations  are  large  business  entities  or  their  tax-exempt  adjuncts.  Some 
nonproﬁt  corporations  are  created  for  an  ideological  purpose.  Some 
closely  held  corporations  are  strongly  identiﬁed  with  a  particular  owner 
or founder.  The fact that § 203, like the statute at issue in Austin, regu­
lates some of these corporations’ expenditures does not disturb the analy­
sis  above.  See  494  U. S.,  at  661–665.  Small-business  owners  may  speak 
in their own names,  rather than the business’, if they wish  to evade § 203 
altogether.  Nonproﬁt  corporations  that  want  to  make  unrestricted  elec­
tioneering  expenditures  may  do  so  if  they  refuse  donations  from  busi­
nesses  and  unions  and  permit  members  to  disassociate  without  economic 
penalty.  See MCFL, 479 U. S. 238, 264 (1986).  Making it plain that their 
decision  is  not  motivated  by  a  concern  about  BCRA’s  coverage  of  non­
proﬁts  that  have  ideological  missions  but  lack  MCFL  status,  our  col­
leagues  refuse  to  apply  the  Snowe-Jeffords  Amendment  or  the  lower 
courts’ de minimis exception to MCFL.  See ante, at 327–329.