Court Opinion

ID: 9467306
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:44:59.300949+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:16.884789
License: Public Domain

PELL, Circuit Judge,
with whom FAIR-CHILD, Chief Judge, and BAUER, Circuit Judge, join, concurring in part, dissenting in part.
While I concur in parts II, V, and VI of the majority opinion, I am in disagreement with parts III and IV and their negative answers to the district court’s certified questions 1 and 2. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent as to parts III and IV of the majority opinion.
As a matter of prefatory observation, I note that a fact of modern day living is that anyone who has a mailing address which has been in existence for a duration of more than a minimal period of time is besieged by a rather steady succession of solicitations to contribute to invariably worthwhile causes. These unsolicited solicitations, despite the merits applicable to the proposed donees are, by virtue of their multiplicity, frequently annoying. Nevertheless, it does not seem to me that potential annoyance should be the occasion for spreading a protective Big Brother cloak of prohibition.
Also at the outset, I note that the question of whether 2 U.S.C. § 441b(b)(4)(D) infringes the plaintiffs’ First Amendment right of speech was not certified to this court by the district court. It is well established, however, that solicitation implicates a variety of speech interests, Village of Schaumburg v. Citizens for a Better Environment, 444 U.S. 620, 632, 100 S.Ct. 826, 833, 63 L.Ed.2d 73 (1980),1 as well as associational rights protected by the First Amendment. Consequently, it is impossible to extricate that subsection’s effect on speech from an analysis of associational interests even assuming arguendo that this court is bound by the precise questions certified.2

*636
Prior Restraint

Subsection (D)’s requirement that a trade association obtain the prior approval of its corporate member before soliciting the shareholders and executive and administrative personnel of the corporate member is, in my opinion, an invalid prior restraint. The majority holds that subsection (D) does not constitute a prior restraint because it finds no actual prior restraining effect on the free flow of political information, inasmuch as the plaintiffs still engage in many First Amendment activities.
It is true, as the majority opinion notes, that the plaintiffs do still undertake various forms of political expression. Yet, the First Amendment does not protect the rights of speech and assembly only when they are entirely abrogated. The United States Supreme Court repeatedly has stressed that total suppression of speech is not necessary to invoke First Amendment protections against otherwise invalid prior restraints. Consolidated Edison Co. v. Public Service Commission,-U.S.-, 100 S.Ct. 2326, 2335 n.10, 65 L.Ed.2d 319 (1980); Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, Inc., 425 U.S. 748, 757 n.15, 96 S.Ct. 1817, 1823 n.15, 48 L.Ed.2d 346 (1978); Southeastern Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, 420 U.S. 546, 556, 95 S.Ct. 1239, 1245, 43 L.Ed.2d 448 (1974); Spence v. Washington, 418 U.S. 405, 411 n.4, 94 S.Ct. 2727, 2731, 41 L.Ed.2d 842 (1973) (per curiam). In Southeastern Promotions, supra, 420 U.S. at 556, 95 S.Ct. at 1245, for example, the Court acknowledged that “it does not matter for purposes of this case that the board’s decision might not have had the effect of total suppression of the musical [“Hair”] in the community.” Likewise, the fact that the plaintiffs in the instant case take advantage of avenues of political expression other than the solicitation of the prohibited groups will not validate an otherwise invalid prior restraint.
The majority opinion seems to conclude that there is no prior restraining effect in part because the plaintiffs are free to solicit anyone to join their organizations and, once someone joins, that person can be solicited for contributions as a trade association member an unlimited number of times. That technically is true. The Federal Election Commission (FEC or Commission), however, has so broadly construed the term “solicitation” as to create inhibiting doubt even on the solicitation of memberships.3
The Commission’s Advisory Opinion 1979-13, for example, prohibits an organization from publishing “an article in its corporate newsletter which would inform employees of the activities and existence of its separate segregated fund,” Federal Election Campaign Financing Guide 15403 at 10,419 (CCH) (dissenting opinion of Chairmen Aikens and Friedersdorf) (emphasis added), merely because the article “commend[ed] the enthusiasm of employees whose participation . . . has indicated awareness of the connection between their welfare and government policies toward business.” Id. In that case, the Commission found the proposed article to be an unlawful “solicitation” even though it contained no request for contributions. The Commission’s broad interpretation of “solicitations,” coupled with the Federal Election Campaign Act’s (FECA or Act) harsh civil *637and criminal sanctions,4 has, as a practical matter, substantially inhibited the plaintiffs’ ability to communicate with the shareholders and administrative and executive employees of member corporations in their common political cause.
The majority’s assertion that trade associations are free to urge any individual to support or oppose a particular candidate does not render subsection (D)’s prohibition any less severe. The United States Supreme Court recognized in Buckley v. Va-leo, 424 U.S. 1, 22, 96 S.Ct. 612, 636, 46 L.Ed.2d 659 (1976), that money contributions enable “like-minded persons to pool their resources in furtherance of common political goals.” Thus, while the organizations can urge anyone to support a particular candidate, their inability to solicit still impinges upon their associational interests. The Court recognized that the right to association “is diluted if it does not include the right to pool money through contributions, for funds are often essential if ‘advocacy’ is to be truly or optimally ‘effective.’ ” Buckley v. Valeo, supra, 424 U.S. at 65-66, 96 S.Ct. at 656. Solicitation of member corporations’ shareholders and administrative and executive personnel provides a particularly important source of funds for the trade associations since many of their members are corporations which are prohibited by § 441b(a) from contributing.
Finally, the majority’s recognition that the plaintiffs can accept contributions from anyone, although they cannot solicit everyone, appears to me to be irrelevant. The trade associations’ First Amendment interests in speech and association are nonetheless curbed by their inability to solicit those with whom they share an affinity of interest but who do not happen to contribute.
The district court’s findings of fact illustrate that, while the plaintiffs can and do engage in some First Amendment activity, the prior restraint set up by subsection (D) has exerted a chilling effect on the exercise of First Amendment rights by the trade associations and the potential recipients of the solicitation.5 The district court found, for example, that in 1977 the Restaurateurs Political Action Committee (RPAC) requested permission to solicit from 7,509 of the National Restaurant Association’s (NRA) corporate members, but received permission from only 1,087. In 1978 only 1,168 members, out of the 15,759 requested, granted permission to solicit. Moreover, during its annual fundraising banquet in 1977, RPAC experienced a loss of members who were willing to sell tickets because of fear of the Act’s criminal and civil penalties for violating the Act. Because of these and other difficulties imposed by the Act, the banquet was abandoned in 1978. The court also found that Bread Political Action Committee (BreadPAC) has not been able to receive authorization from the member corporations of the American Bakers Association (ABA) to solicit since 1976. But for the restriction imposed by subsection (D), the Committee would solicit the executive and administrative employees and shareholders of the member corporations. Finally, the district court found that
[t]he 1976 Amendments to the Act have limited the ability of each of the Plaintiffs to raise voluntary funds for political purposes, have limited each Plaintiff’s ability to engage in protected political speech and association, and have limited the right of persons with similar or related interests to receive from the Plaintiffs communications expressing political ideas, opinions, views, and beliefs and thereby associate themselves with the Plaintiffs.
Subsection (D) admittedly does not resemble the typical prior restraint which involves delegation of unlimited discretion to an administrative official. This is a distinction without a difference, however, because “[a]ny system of prior restraint of expression comes to this Court bearing a heavy presumption against its constitutional valid*638ity.” Vance v. Universal Amusement Co., 445 U.S. 308, 317, 100 S.Ct. 1156, 1161, 63 L.Ed.2d 413 (1980) (emphasis in original), quoting Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U.S. 58, 70, 83 S.Ct. 631, 639, 9 L.Ed.2d 584 (1963). See, e. g., ACLU v. Jennings, 366 F.Supp. 1041, 1049-52 (D.D.C.1973), vacated sub nom., Staats v. ACLU, 422 U.S. 1030, 95 S.Ct. 2646, 45 L.Ed.2d 686 (1975) (FECA provision held to be a prior restraint even though the Court acknowledged that it technically did not resemble a typical licensing system because the Act designated the media, not the government, to act as censor).
A statute subjecting First Amendment freedoms to a prior restraint will be upheld only if it enunciates definite and objective standards to guide the censor’s discretion. Shuttlesworth v. City of Birmingham, 394 U.S. 147, 150-51, 89 S.Ct. 935, 938, 22 L.Ed.2d 162 (1969). In the present case, the Act wholly fails to establish any standards to harness the member corporations’ discretion except that a corporation cannot approve solicitation by more than one trade association per year. Thus, a corporation arbitrarily can deny permission to solicit for any reason whatsoever even if it has not yet granted permission to any other trade association for that year.
A judgment that subsection (D) operates as an invalid prior restraint would not compel the conclusion that Congress cannot regulate trade association solicitation in any manner whatsoever. Rather, the statute fails because it does not set up adequate procedural safeguards. The Supreme Court has recognized that “[i]n the area of freedom of expression it is well established that one has standing to challenge a statute on the ground that it delegates overly broad licensing discretion to an administrative office, whether or not his conduct could be proscribed by a properly drawn statute.” Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U.S. 51, 56, 85 S.Ct. 734, 737, 13 L.Ed.2d 646 (1965). Infringement of First Amendment Freedoms
Even if § 441b(b)(4)(D) were not invalid as a prior restraint, it would nevertheless be unconstitutional for impermissibly infringing the plaintiffs’ rights of speech and assembly.6 While these rights are not absolute, “governmental ‘action which may have the effect of curtailing the freedom to associate is subject to the closest scrutiny.’ ” Buckley v. Valeo, supra, 424 U.S. at 24, 96 S.Ct. at 637, quoting NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449, 460-61, 78 S.Ct. 1163, 1170, 2 L.Ed.2d 1488 (1958). The Court in Buckley, supra, 424 U.S. at 25, 96 S.Ct. at 637, ruled that a statute infringing First Amendment rights can only be sustained if (1) the restriction serves a “sufficiently important [governmental] interest,” and (2) it “employs means closely drawn to avoid unnecessary abridgment of associational freedoms.” A statute infringing First Amendment freedoms will be invalid if less restrictive means of accomplishing the governmental objective are available. Village of Schaum-burg, supra, 444 U.S. at 637, 100 S.Ct. at 836. The Federal Election Campaign Act was enacted primarily to diminish the actuality and appearance of corruption in the federal election process resulting from large financial contributions. Buckley v. Valeo, supra, 424 U.S. at 25, 96 S.Ct. at 637. In Buckley, the Court’s decision to uphold contribution limitations (while simultaneously striking down expenditure ceilings) was largely premised on the understanding that contribution ceilings would not reduce resources available to both candidates and political committees. It is important to note that Buckley predated the Act’s restrictions on trade association solicitation. The Court reasoned:
Given the important role of contributions in financing political campaigns, contribution restrictions could have a severe impact on political dialogue if the limitations prevented candidates and political committees from amassing the resources *639necessary for effective advocacy. There is no indication, however, that the contribution limitations imposed by the Act would have any dramatic adverse effect on the funding of campaigns and political associations. The overall effect of the Act’s contribution ceilings is merely to require candidates and political committees to raise funds from a greater number of persons.
424 U.S. at 21-22, 96 S.Ct. at 635.
Subsection (D) nonetheless has dramatically decreased the available pool of potential contributors to the plaintiff organizations. The Lumber Dealers Political Action Committee’s (LuDPAC) eight largest federated members informed LuDPAC that, but for the Act’s 1976 amendments, they would have supplied LuDPAC with their membership rosters which total over 4,300 retail dealers. RPAC similarly was unable to solicit over 100,000 persons present at each of the NRA’s annual 1977, 1978, and 1979 conventions who otherwise would have constituted an available solicitation pool. Bread Political Action Committee’s solicitations likewise were limited by subsection (D). In 1975, BreadPAC solicited 1,250 individuals; from January to May 1976, BreadPAC had already solicited 1,904 persons. Prom May 11, 1976, the effective date of the 1976 amendments, through December 1976, the number of individuals solicited by Bread-PAC dropped to 462. In 1977, only 577 persons and in 1978 only 421 persons, were solicited.
The drop in the number of persons available for solicitation was reflected in a dramatic decrease in contributions. Bread-PAC’s contributions, for example, declined from $40,190 in 1975, to $38,712 in 1976, to $28,000 in 1977 and $29,550 in 1978. The statistics indicate that the premise of Buckley, that contribution totals received by candidates and political associations should not be diminished by the Act’s restrictions, is subverted by subsection (D).
The majority cites employee freedom from employer economic coercion as one purpose underlying the enactment of subsection (D). While this objective may have motivated Congress, the restrictions imposed on trade associations do not, in fact, serve that goal. The direct employment relationship existing between employer and employee provides an inherently coercive setting for employer solicitation. Martin Tractor Co. v. FEC, 627 F.2d 375, 387 (D.C.Cir.1980). Yet, § 441b(b)(4)(B) allows corporate employers to solicit any corporate employee twice yearly.
The Act seeks to limit further employee solicitation by requiring prior corporate approval for solicitation by trade associations. The Government contended that because trade associations represent corporate interests, corporate employees will feel bound to contribute to the associations. In fact, the potential for such coercion logically should be less in the trade association context than in the direct employer/employee relationship because employees do not depend upon the trade associations for their livelihood. Even if some compulsion arguably exists, subsection (D) heightens, rather than diminishes, any such coercion. Explicit corporate consent to trade association solicitation subtly, yet directly, would appear to suggest to employees that the employer favors a contribution.
As well as subverting the very purpose it was intended to serve, subsection (D) imposes a substantial impact upon associational freedoms. The plaintiffs’ expert testified that corporate employees share an “affinity of interest” with the trade associations to which their corporate employers belong.
Consequently, subsection (D) is not a narrowly drawn provision which achieves the asserted governmental objective as the First Amendment requires. Other less drastic means could ensure employee freedom from coercion at the hands of trade associations while treading less severely upon invaluable First Amendment rights. The Act could, for example, require trade association solicitations to remind the corporate employees that they need not contribute. The Act could additionally mandate that a system of solicitation be adopted which would guarantee the anonymity of the contributor. Congress applied just such *640safeguards to a corporation’s solicitation of its own employees in preference to an absolute ban.7
The majority further reasons that because there are no limits on the number of trade associations to which a corporation can belong, subsection (D) prevents a proliferation of trade associations which might allow member corporations to undermine the Act’s contribution limitations.8 The Government argued that this result would flow from the fact that member corporations often are involved in the selection of a trade association’s board of directors and that, therefore, a corporation could set up a number of “dummy” trade associations. The FEC contended that corporate members “control” trade associations’ boards of directors.
The district court’s findings of fact regarding the composition of the boards of directors in the instant case, however, indicate that the danger is overstated. Two directors each of the National Lumber and Building Material Dealers Association are selected by each federated member, the past two national presidents, the Association’s officers, and various other persons. The NRA’s board of directors, which numbers sixty members, is selected to represent NRA members according to their geographical distribution. Each member of the American Bakers Association is entitled to send one representative to sit on the ABA’s governing board which is made up of approximately 350 individuals with another 350 alternates. It is obvious, therefore, that individual corporate “control” of any of these trade associations is diluted by the numbers of representatives of different corporations which compose each trade association’s board of directors. While the directors undoubtedly share many similar interests, their diversity in terms of factors such as size, product, or location necessarily restricts their potential identity of interest.
Finally, the Act provides other mechanisms to ensure contribution limitation compliance. Section 437g (Supp.1979) imposes civil and criminal penalties for violating the Act. Moreover, FECA establishes a comprehensive set of reporting requirements. All political committees and separate segregated funds, for example, must file with the Commission information including names of affiliated organizations, names of officers, receipts, expenditures and their recipients, names of each person, organization or political committee which has contributed over $200 per year, and any other information the Commission chooses to require.9 No single corporation could set up a “dummy” trade association solely to subvert the Act without being exposed by the disclosure requirements and without being subject to criminal sanctions for having willfully violated the Act. Indeed, the Court in Buckley rejected the similar argument that limitations on candidate expenditures were necessary to ensure compliance with the Act’s contribution limitations because the Act’s substantial civil and criminal penalties, coupled with its exhaustive reporting requirements, were sufficient to police against illicit contributions. 424 U.S. at 56, 96 S.Ct. at 652. The Court in Buckley sustained the Act’s contribution limitations because such limitations still allowed individuals to support candidates through special interest groups. At a time when subsection (D) did not restrict trade association solicitation in *641the present manner, the Court noted with approval that
[w]hile providing significant limitations on the ability of all individuals and groups to contribute large amounts of money to candidates, the Act’s contribution ceilings do not foreclose the making of substantial contributions to candidates by some major special-interest groups through the combined effect of individual contributions from adherents or the proliferation of political funds each authorized under the Act to contribute to candidates.
424 U.S. at 28 n.31, 96 S.Ct. at 639 n.31.

Fifth Amendment Due Process

The majority characterizes the plaintiffs’ due process argument as a complaint that subsection (D) prohibits trade associations from soliciting anyone but the executive and administrative employees of their member corporations. The opinion then proceeds to strike down that argument by pointing out that incorporated trade associations have the same solicitation rights as (1) other corporations under § 441b(b)(4)(A) and (B), and (2) other membership organizations under subsection (C), although recognizing that the structure and constituency of trade associations differs radically from that of other corporations and membership organizations.
The plaintiffs’ argument is not that they are forbidden by the statute from soliciting anyone other than the group mentioned in subsection (D). Rather, the trade associations argue that while the statute technically does grant them many of the same privileges as those enjoyed by corporations and other membership organizations, these solicitation rights are largely illusory because the actual structure of most incorporated trade associations forecloses these solicitation options. The Supreme Court in Buckley, 424 U.S. at 31 n.33, 96 S.Ct. at 640 n.33, recognized that even when a statute facially appears to be evenhanded, “[t]he appearance of fairness, however, may not reflect political reality.”
Most trade associations and federated trade associations are incorporated. As corporations, it is true that trade associations theoretically can solicit their own stockholders under § 441b(b)(4)(A). However, the Government conceded in oral argument that most incorporated trade associations are nonprofit corporations which do not have any stockholders. Thus, the typical corporation possesses a substantially greater solicitation pool than an incorporated trade association.
As a corporation, an incorporated trade association may also solicit its own executive and administrative employees and their families pursuant to subsection (A). Again, however, this pool comprises a very small group of solicitees for trade associations in comparison to most corporations. The ABA, for example, has only a twelve person staff. We do not know how many of these twelve are executive or administrative employees. BreadPAC has no staff employees of its own. ABA employees carry out BreadPAC’s daily work. Similarly, the small size of most trade association staffs renders meaningless subsection (B)’s additional provision allowing corporations twice yearly to solicit their rank and file employees.
As a membership organization, a trade association can solicit its own individual and noncorporate members pursuant to subsection (C). Corporate members are prohibited from contributing by § 441b(a). Individual and noncorporate members, however, also offer an insignificant solicitation pool to trade associations unlike other more typical membership organizations. The district court found that “many, if not most, members of trade associations are incorporated.”
It is this very difference in structure that should give rise to broadened, not restricted, solicitation rights for trade associations because the statutory avenues of solicitation available to corporations and membership organizations generally prove fruitless when applied to incorporated trade associations. Yet, subsection (D) requires corporate consent to carry on the only form of trade association solicitation which would *642prove meaningful. My reading of the record indicates that such consent is generally refused.
A comparison between labor organizations and trade associations is illustrative. Labor organizations can, without consent, twice annually solicit shareholders and nonmember employees of corporations with which they have collective bargaining agreements. § 441b(b)(4)(B) (Supp.1979). Moreover, both a federated labor organization (e. g., AFL-CIO) and its member International (e. g., International Carpenters’ Union) can solicit individual members of the locals which comprise the Internationals simultaneously and without prior permission because 11 C.F.R. § 114.1(e) (1980) provides that a local union member is also a member of the federated union for solicitation purposes.
By contrast, a federated trade association must either conduct joint solicitations or have solicitation rights delegated to it in order to solicit the members of its member trade associations. 11 C.F.R. 114.8(g) (1980). Because solicitation of regular trade association member corporations themselves is barred by § 441b(a) as the majority acknowledged, the only practical solicitation of trade association members (most of which are corporations) would be to solicit the trade association member corporation’s stockholders and executive and administrative employees, the human components of the member corporations.10 Yet, subsection (D) prohibits such solicitation without prior corporate consent.
The Government contended in oral argument that these distinctions between labor organizations and trade associations are valid because federated unions and their International members are “affiliated,” and, as such, share a common $5,000 limitation on contribution to candidates for federal office. A federated trade association, however, can only solicit its regional, state and local affiliates or members if it is affiliated with these groups and, therefore, shares the $5,000 contribution limitation. 11 C.F.R. § 114.8(g)(1) (1980). Thus, the purported difference is irrelevant.
The discrimination alleged by the plaintiffs is borne out by the district court’s findings of fact. The court found that “[t]he 1976 Amendments to the Act place no comparable prohibitions and limitations upon membership organizations and their political action committees, corporations and their political action committees, labor organizations and their political action committees, or independent political action committees.” 11 The unique structure and composition characteristic of most trade associations differentiates them from other corporations and membership organizations as detailed above. It is this very difference, augmented by subsection (D)’s prior consent provision, which gives rise to the discrimination which the plaintiffs suffer under the statute as applied.
In order for a discriminatory classification which impacts upon fundamental First Amendment rights to survive judicial scrutiny, the governmental interest served must be substantial and the statutory classification narrowly tailored to serve that interest. Police Department of Chicago v. Mosley, 408 U.S. 92, 98-99, 92 S.Ct. 2286, 2291, 33 L.Ed.2d 212 (1972). As detailed above, sub*643section (D) is not a narrowly drawn classification which serves the interests asserted.

. The Court identified three speech interests involved in solicitation: communication of information, dissemination of ideas, and advocacy of causes. Id.

. In the instant case, the plaintiffs’ proposed statement of constitutional questions for certification phrased the first issue more broadly than the district court’s final formulation. The plaintiffs would have certified the question as “[w]hether 2 U.S.C. § 441b(b)(4)(D), both fa-*636daily and as applied, violates the First Amendment.” Judge Marshall subsequently narrowed the proposal to reach only subsection (D)’s effect on the right of assembly.
2 U.S.C. § 437h(a) (Supp.1979) provides that “[t]he district court immediately shall certify all questions of constitutionality of this Act to the United States courts of appeals for the circuit involved, which shall hear the matter sitting en banc” (emphasis added). It would seem therefore that a district court’s failure or refusal so to certify all constitutional questions cannot be insulated from appellate review. The majority apparently assumes that this court is not bound by the precise constitutional questions certified because it addresses the pri- or restraint issue which, it acknowledges, was not specifically certified.

. I am not unmindful that I have concurred in Part V of the majority opinion. I have done so because I do not regard the term “solicitation” as such as being either overbroad or vague, which is not to say that it may not very well achieve a chilling impact by political overextension.

. 2 U.S.C. § 437g (Supp.1979).

. First Amendment protections extend to the communication, the speaker, and the intended recipients. Virginia State Bd. of Pharmacy, supra, 425 U.S. at 757, 96 S.Ct. at 1823.

. The majority opinion seems to misconceive the effect of my challenge to subsection (D). I merely think the exception provided by this subsection to subsection (A) should not be rendered virtually meaningless by the imposition of the prior consent provision. In sum, I am only challenging the prior consent aspect.

. 2 U.S.C. §§ 441b(b)(3)(C); 441b(b)(4)(B) (Supp.1979).

. 2 U.S.C. § 441a(a)(l)(C) prohibits contributions by any person to any political committee (other than those of candidates or national political parties) in excess of $5,000 per year; § 441a(a)(l)(A) forbids any contribution to a political candidate for federal office in excess of $1,000 annually.

. 2 U.S.C. §§ 433-34 (Supp.1979). I also note 2 U.S.C. § 441a(a)(5) which provides as follows:
For the purposes of the limitations provided by paragraph (1) and paragraph (2), all contributions made by political committees established or financed or maintained or controlled by any corporation, labor organization, or any other person, including any parent, subsidiary, branch, division, department, or local unit of such corporation, labor organization, or any other person, or by any group of such persons, shall be considered to have been made by a single political committee....

. It is understandable that the plaintiffs do not seek to solicit all corporate employees because all corporate employees would not share the same commonality of interest with the trade association as would the corporate shareholders and executive and administrative personnel.

. The majority opinion develops at some length an orange-apple lack of relationship between unions and trade associations. I have not, in this dissent, asserted that they are “similarly situated” parties. I do suggest, however, that just as certain loyalties and commonalities of purpose do exist between a union and its membership, similar communities of interest may well exist between corporate shareholders and executive employees and the trade associations of which the corporation is a member. These trade associations have been formed for the purposes of advancing the best business interests of the particular trade. It would seem unusual if the shareholders and executive employees, whose own financial well being would be equated with that of the corporation, indeed, the trade, did not have a real interest in supporting the trade associations, that is, if they were allowed to be solicited.