Opinion ID: 131149
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Coordination Provisions

Text: Other BCRA Title II sections require analysis alongside the provisions of Title I, for they, too, are regulations that principally operate within the ambit of Buckley 's anticorruption principle. BCRA §§ 202 and 214 are two of these provisions. They involve the Act's new definition of coordination. BCRA § 213 is another. It institutes a new system in which the parties are forced to choose between two different types of relationships with their candidates.
I agree with the majority that §§ 214(b) and (c) do not merit our review because they are not now justiciable. See ante, at 223. I disagree, however, with the majority's view that § 214(a), § 214's sole justiciable provision, is valid. Nor can I agree that § 202 is valid in its entirety. Section 214(a) amends FECA to define, as hard-money contributions to a political party, expenditures an individual makes in concert with the party. See ante, at 219. This provision, in my view, must fall. As the earlier discussion of Title I explains, individual contributions to the political parties cannot be capped in the soft-money context. Since an individual's soft-money contributions to a party may not be limited, it follows with even greater force that an individual's expenditure of money, coordinated with the party for activities on which the party could spend unlimited soft money, cannot be capped. This conclusion emerges not only from an analysis of Title I but also from Colorado I. There, JUSTICE BREYER'S opinion announcing the judgment of the Court concluded political parties had a constitutional right to engage in independent advocacy on behalf of a candidate. 518 U.S. 604 (1996). That parties can spend unlimited soft money on this activity follows by necessary implication. A political party's constitutional right to spend money on advocacy independent of a candidate is burdened by § 214(a) in a direct and substantial way. The statute commands the party to refrain from coordinating with an individual engaging in advocacy even if the individual is acting independently of the candidate. Section 202 functions in a manner similar to the operation of § 214(a). It directs that when persons make electioneering communication, see new FECA § 304(f)(3), 2 U.S.C.A. § 434(f)(3) (Supp. 2003), in a coordinated fashion with a candidate or a party, the coordinated communication expense must be treated as a hard-money contribution by the person to that candidate or party. The trial court erroneously believed it needed to determine whether § 304's definition of electioneering communications was itself unconstitutional to assess this provision. While a statutory definition may lead to an unconstitutional result under one application, it may lead to a constitutional result under another. Compare infra this page and 321-322 with infra, at 333-337. It is unhelpful to talk in terms of the definition being unconstitutional or constitutional when the only relevant question is whether, as animated by a substantive prohibition, here § 202, the definition leads to unconstitutional results. The other Title II provisions that employ § 304's electioneering communication definition are analyzed below, within the context of the corporate speech rationale and the disclosure provisions. Section 202, however, must be judged under the anticorruption rationale because it does not distinguish according to corporate or union status, and it does not involve disclosure requirements. Section 202 simply limits the speech of all persons. Section 202 does satisfy Buckley 's anticorruption rationale in one respect: It treats electioneering communications expenditures made by a person in coordination with a candidate as hard-money contributions to that candidate. For many of the same reasons that § 323(e) is valid, § 202, in this single way, is valid: It regulates conduct that poses a quid pro quo danger  satisfaction of a candidate's request. Insofar as § 202 regulates coordination with a political party, however, it suffers from the same flaws as § 214(a). Congress has instructed us, as much as possible, to sever any infirm portions of statutory text from the valid parts, see BCRA § 401. Following that instruction, I would uphold § 202's text as to its candidate coordination regulation (the first clause of new FECA § 315(a)(7)(C)(ii), 2 U.S.C.A. § 441a(a)(7)(C)(ii) (Supp. 2003), but rule invalid its text that applies the coordination provision to political parties. This provision includes an advance contracts aspect as well. That aspect of the provision, on its own, would be invalid, for many of the reasons discussed below with respect to the advance disclosure requirements embodied in BCRA § § 201 and 212. See infra, at 321-322.
The final aspect of BCRA that implicates Buckley 's anticorruption rationale is § 213, the forced choice provision. The majority concludes § 213 violates the Constitution. I agree and write on this aspect of the case to point out that the section's unlawfulness flows not from the unique contours of the statute that settle how much political parties may spend on their candidate's campaign, see ante, at 215-219, but from its raw suppression of constitutionally protected speech. Section 213 unconstitutionally forces the parties to surrender one of two First Amendment rights. We affirmed that parties have a constitutionally protected right to make independent expenditures in Colorado I. I continue to believe, moreover, that even under Buckley a political party has a protected right to make coordinated expenditures with its candidates. See Colorado II , 533 U.S., at 466-482 (THOMAS, J., dissenting). Our well-established constitutional tradition respects the role parties play in the electoral process and in stabilizing our representative democracy. There can be little doubt that the emergence of a strong and stable two-party system in this country has contributed enormously to sound and effective government. Davis v. Bandemer , 478 U.S. 109, 144-145 (1986) (O'CONNOR, J., concurring in judgment). This role would be undermined in the absence of a party's ability to coordinate with candidates. Cf. Colorado I, supra, at 629 (KENNEDY, J., concurring in judgment and dissenting in part) (parties can give effect to their views only by selecting and supporting candidates). Section 213's command that the parties abandon one First Amendment right or the other offends the Constitution even more than a command that a person choose between a First Amendment right and a statutory right.