Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/558bv.pdf
Page Number: 568.0

Cite as: 558 U. S. 310 (2010) 

407 

Opinion of Stevens, J. 

qualifying  organization  from  the  ambit  of  MCFL.14  This 
Court could have simply followed their lead.15 

Finally,  let  us  not  forget  Citizens  United’s  as-applied 
constitutional  challenge.  Precisely because  Citizens  United 
looks  so  much  like  the  MCFL  organizations  we  have  ex­
empted  from  regulation,  while  a  feature-length  video-on­
demand  ﬁlm  looks  so  unlike  the  types  of  electoral  advocacy 
Congress has found deserving of regulation, this challenge is 
a  substantial  one.  As  the  appellant’s  own  arguments  show, 
the Court could have easily limited the breadth of its consti­
tutional holding had it declined to adopt the novel notion that 
speakers  and  speech  acts  must  always  be  treated  identi­
cally—and  always  spared  expenditures  restrictions—in  the 
political realm.  Yet the Court nonetheless turns its back on 
the as-applied review process that has been a staple of cam­
paign  ﬁnance  litigation  since  Buckley  v.  Valeo,  424  U. S.  1 

14 See  Colorado  Right  to  Life  Comm.,  Inc.  v.  Coffman,  498  F.  3d  1137, 
1148  (CA10  2007)  (adopting  this  rule  and  noting  that  “every  other  circuit 
to  have  addressed  this  issue”  has  done  likewise);  Brief  for  Independent 
Sector as Amicus Curiae 10–11 (collecting cases).  The Court rejects this 
solution in part because the Government “merely suggest[s] it” and “does 
not  say  that  it  agrees  with  the  interpretation.”  Ante,  at  328,  329.  Our 
colleagues  would  thus  punish  a  defendant  for  showing  insufﬁcient  excite­
ment  about  a  ground  it  has  advanced,  at  the  same  time  that  they  decide 
the  case  on  a  ground  the  plaintiff  expressly  abandoned.  The  Court  also 
protests  that  a  de  minimis  standard  would  “requir[e]  intricate  case-by­
case  determinations.”  Ante,  at  329.  But  de  minimis  tests  need  not  be 
intricate at all.  A test that granted MCFL status to § 501(c)(4) organiza­
tions if they received less than a ﬁxed dollar amount of business donations 
in  the previous  year, or  if  such donations  represent  less than  a ﬁxed  per­
centage  of  their  total  assets,  would  be  perfectly  easy  to  understand  and 
administer. 

15 Another bypassed ground, not briefed by the parties, would have been 
to revive the Snowe-Jeffords Amendment in BCRA § 203(c), allowing cer­
tain nonproﬁt corporations to pay for electioneering communications with 
general treasury funds, to the extent they can trace the payments to indi­
vidual contributions.  See Brief for National Riﬂe Association as Amicus 
Curiae 5–15 (arguing forcefully that Congress intended this result).