Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/558bv.pdf
Page Number: 561.0

400  CITIZENS  UNITED  v.  FEDERAL  ELECTION  COMM’N 

Opinion of Stevens, J. 

basis  of  factually  barebones  records.”  Id.,  at  450  (internal 
quotation  marks  omitted).  In  this  case,  the  record  is  not 
simply incomplete or unsatisfactory; it is nonexistent.  Con­
gress  crafted  BCRA  in  response  to  a  virtual  mountain  of 
research  on  the  corruption  that  previous  legislation  had 
failed  to  avert.  The  Court  now  negates  Congress’  efforts 
without  a  shred  of  evidence  on  how  § 203  or  its  state-law 
counterparts have been affecting any entity other than Citi­
zens United.5 

Faced with this gaping empirical hole, the majority throws 
up  its  hands.  Were  we  to  conﬁne  our  inquiry  to  Citizens 
United’s  as-applied  challenge,  it  protests,  we  would  com­
mence  an  “extended”  process  of  “draw[ing],  and  then  re­
draw[ing], constitutional lines based on the particular media 
or  technology  used  to  disseminate  political  speech  from  a 
particular  speaker.”  Ante,  at  326.  While  tacitly  acknowl­
edging that some applications of § 203 might be found consti­
tutional,  the  majority  thus  posits  a  future  in  which  novel 
First  Amendment  standards  must  be  devised  on  an  ad  hoc 
basis,  and  then  leaps  from  this  unfounded  prediction  to  the 
unfounded  conclusion  that  such  complexity  counsels  the 
abandonment  of  all  normal  restraint.  Yet  it  is  a  pervasive 

5 In  fact,  we  do  not  even  have  a  good  evidentiary  record  of  how  § 203 
has been affecting Citizens United, which never submitted to the District 
Court  the  details  of  Hillary’s  funding  or  its  own  ﬁnances.  We  likewise 
have  no  evidence  of  how  § 203  and  comparable  state  laws  were  expected 
to affect corporations and unions in the future. 

It  is  true,  as  the  majority  points  out,  that  the  McConnell  Court  evalu­
ated the facial validity of § 203 in light of an extensive record.  See ante, 
at  331–332.  But  that  record  is  not  before  us  in  this  case.  And  in  any 
event, the majority’s argument for striking down § 203 depends on its con­
tention that the statute has proved too “chilling” in practice—and in par­
ticular  on  the  contention  that  the  controlling  opinion  in  WRTL,  551  U. S. 
449  (2007),  failed  to  bring  sufﬁcient  clarity  and  “breathing  space”  to  this 
area  of  law.  See  ante,  at  329,  333–336.  We  have  no  record  with  which 
to assess that claim.  The Court complains at length about the burdens of 
complying  with  § 203,  but  we  have  no  meaningful  evidence  to  show  how 
regulated corporations and unions have experienced its restrictions.