Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/13pdf/12-536_e1pf.pdf
Page Number: 38

32 

MCCUTCHEON v. FEDERAL ELECTION COMM’N 

Opinion of ROBERTS, C. J. 

contribute  only  a  small  fraction  of  their  campaign  funds
to  other  candidates.  Authorized  candidate  committees 
may support other candidates up to a $2,000 base limit.  2 
U. S. C.  §432(e)(3)(B).    In  the  2012  election,  House  candi-
dates spent a total of $1.1 billion.  Candidate-to-candidate 
contributions  among  House  candidates  totaled  $3.65
million, making up just 0.3% of candidates’ overall spend-
ing.  NRSC  Brief  29.  The  most  that  any  one  individual
candidate  received  from  all  other  candidates  was  around 
$100,000.  Brief  for  Appellee  39.    The  fact  is  that  candi-
dates  who  receive  campaign  contributions  spend  most  of
the money on themselves, rather than passing along dona-
tions  to  other  candidates.  In  this  arena  at  least,  charity 
begins at home.10 

Based  on  what  we  can  discern  from  experience,  the
indiscriminate  ban  on  all  contributions  above  the  aggre-
gate  limits  is  disproportionate  to  the  Government’s  inter-
est in preventing circumvention.  The Government has not 
given  us  any  reason  to  believe  that  parties  or  candidates 
would  dramatically  shift  their  priorities  if  the  aggregate
limits  were  lifted.  Absent  such  a  showing,  we  cannot 
conclude that the sweeping aggregate limits are appropri-
ately  tailored  to  guard  against  any  contributions  that 
might 
implicate  the  Government’s  anticircumvention 
interest. 

A final point: It is worth keeping in mind that the base 
limits themselves are a prophylactic measure.  As we have 
—————— 

10 In  addition,  the  percentage  of  contributions  above  the  aggregate 
limits  that  even  could be used for circumvention is limited  by the fact
that  many  of  the  modes  of  potential  circumvention  can  be  used  only
once  each  election.    For  example,  if  one  donor  gives  $2,600  to  100 
candidates with safe House seats in the hopes that each candidate will
reroute  $2,000  to  Representative  Smith,  a  candidate  in  a  contested
district, no other donor can do the same, because the candidates in the 
safe seats will have exhausted their permissible contributions to Smith.
So there is no risk that the circumvention scheme will repeat itself with
multiple other would-be donors to Smith.