NIXON, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF MISSOURI, et al. v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC et al.

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NIXON, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF MISSOURI, et al.
v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC et al.
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for
the eighth circuit
No. 98–963. Argued October 5, 1999—Decided January 24, 2000
Respondents Shrink Missouri Government PAC, a political action commit-
tee, and Zev David Fredman, a candidate for the 1998 Republican nomi-
nation for Missouri state auditor, filed suit, alleging that a Missouri stat-
ute imposing limits ranging from $275 to $1,075 on contributions to
candidates for state office violated their First and Fourteenth Amend-
ment rights. Shrink Missouri gave Fredman $1,025 in 1997, and $50 in
1998, and represented that, without the statutory limitation, it would
contribute more. Fredman alleged he could campaign effectively only
with more generous contributions than the statute allowed. On cross-
motions for summary judgment, the District Court sustained the stat-
ute. Applying Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (per curiam), the court
found adequate support for the law in the proposition that large contri-
butions raise suspicions of influence peddling tending to undermine citi-
zens’ confidence in government integrity. The court rejected respond-
ents’ contention that inflation since Buckley’s approval of a federal
$1,000 restriction meant that the state limit of $1,075 for a statewide
office could not be constitutional today. In reversing, the Eighth Cir-
cuit found that Buckley had articulated and applied a strict scrutiny
standard of review, and held that Missouri had to demonstrate that it
had a compelling interest and that the contribution limits at issue were
narrowly drawn to serve that interest. Treating Missouri’s claim of
a compelling interest in avoiding the corruption or the perception of
corruption caused by candidates’ acceptance of large campaign contribu-
tions as insufficient by itself to satisfy strict scrutiny, the court required
demonstrable evidence that genuine problems resulted from contribu-
tions in amounts greater than the statutory limits. It ruled that the
State’s evidence was inadequate for this purpose.
Held: Buckley is authority for comparable state limits on contributions to
state political candidates, and those limits need not be pegged to the
precise dollar amounts approved in Buckley. Pp. 385–398.
(a) The Buckley Court held, inter alia, that a Federal Election Cam-
paign Act provision placing a $1,000 annual ceiling on independent
expenditures linked to specific candidates for federal office infringed
speech and association guarantees of the First Amendment and the

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Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth, but upheld other provisions
limiting contributions by individuals to any single candidate to $1,000
per election. P. 385.
(b) In addressing the speech claim, the Buckley Court explicitly re-
jected both intermediate scrutiny for communicative action, see United
States v. O’Brien, 391 U. S. 367, and the similar standard applicable to
merely time, place, and manner restrictions, see, e. g., Adderley v. Flor-
ida, 385 U. S. 39, and instead referred generally to “the exacting scru-
tiny required by the First Amendment,” 424 U. S., at 16. The Court
then drew a line between expenditures and contributions, treating ex-
penditure restrictions as direct restraints on speech, id., at 19, but say-
ing, in effect, that limiting contributions left communication significantly
unimpaired, id., at 20–21. The Court flagged a similar difference be-
tween the impacts of expenditure and contribution limits on association
rights, id., at 22; see also id., at 28, and later made that distinction
explicit, e. g., Federal Election Comm’n v. Massachusetts Citizens for
Life, Inc., 479 U. S. 238, 259–260. Thus, under Buckley’s standard of
scrutiny, a contribution limit involving significant interference with as-
sociational rights could survive if the Government demonstrated that
regulating contributions was a means “closely drawn” to match a “suffi-
ciently important interest,” 424 U. S., at 25, though the dollar amount
of the limit need not be “fine tun[ed],” id., at 30. While Buckley did
not attempt to parse distinctions between the speech and associational
standards of scrutiny for contribution limits, the Court made clear that
such restrictions bore more heavily on associational rights than on
speech rights, and thus proceeded on the understanding that a contribu-
tion limitation surviving a claim of associational abridgment would sur-
vive a speech challenge as well. The Court found the prevention of
corruption and the appearance of corruption to be a constitutionally suf-
ficient justification for the contribution limits at issue. Id., at 25–28.
Pp. 386–389.
(c) In defending its statute, Missouri espouses those same interests of
preventing corruption and the appearance of it. Even without Buckley,
there would be no serious question about the legitimacy of these inter-
ests, which underlie bribery and antigratuity statutes. Rather, re-
spondents take the State to task for failing to justify the invocation of
those interests with empirical evidence of actually corrupt practices or
of a perception among Missouri voters that unrestricted contributions
must have been exerting a covertly corrosive influence. The state stat-
ute is not void, however, for want of evidence. The quantum of empiri-
cal evidence needed to satisfy heightened judicial scrutiny of legislative
judgments will vary up or down with the novelty and plausibility of the
justification raised. Buckley demonstrates that the dangers of large,

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corrupt contributions and the suspicion that large contributions are cor-
rupt are neither novel nor implausible. See 424 U. S., at 27, and n. 28.
Respondents are wrong in arguing that this Court has “supplemented”
its Buckley holding with a new requirement that governments enacting
contribution limits must demonstrate that the recited harms are real,
not merely conjectural, a contention for which respondents rely princi-
pally on Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm. v. Federal
Election Comm’n, 518 U. S. 604. This Court has never accepted mere
conjecture as adequate to carry a First Amendment burden, and Colo-
rado Republican deals not with a government’s burden to justify contri-
bution limits, but with limits on independent expenditures by political
parties, which the principal opinion expressly distinguished from contri-
bution limits. Id., at 615–618. In any event, this case does not present
a close call requiring further definition of whatever the State’s eviden-
tiary obligation may be. Although the record does not show that the
Missouri Legislature relied on the evidence and findings accepted in
Buckley, the evidence introduced by petitioners or cited by the lower
courts in this action and a prior case involving a related ballot initiative
is enough to show that the substantiation of the congressional concerns
reflected in Buckley has its counterpart in support of the Missouri law.
Moreover, although majority votes do not, as such, defeat First Amend-
ment protections, the statewide vote adopting the initiative attested to
the public perception that contribution limits are necessary to combat
corruption and the appearance thereof. A more extensive evidentiary
documentation might be necessary if respondents had made any show-
ing of their own to cast doubt on the apparent implications of Buckley’s
evidence and the record here. However, the nearest they come to chal-
lenging these conclusions is their invocation of academic studies that are
contradicted by other studies. Pp. 390–395.
(d) There is no support for respondents’ various arguments that the
Missouri limitations are so different in kind from those sustained in
Buckley as to raise essentially a new issue about the adequacy of the
Missouri statute’s tailoring to serve its purposes. Here, as in Buckley,
supra, at 21, there is no indication that those limits have had any dra-
matic adverse effect on the funding of campaigns and political associa-
tions, and thus there is no showing that the limitations prevented candi-
dates from amassing the resources necessary for effective advocacy.
Indeed, the District Court found that since the Missouri limits became
effective, candidates for state office have been able to raise funds suffi-
cient to run effective campaigns, and that candidates are still able to
amass impressive campaign war chests. The plausibility of these con-
clusions is buttressed by petitioners’ evidence that in the last election
before the contributions became effective, 97.62 percent of all contribu-

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380 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
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tors to candidates for state auditor made contributions of $2,000 or less.
Even assuming that the contribution limits affected respondent
Fredman’s ability to wage a competitive campaign, a showing of one
affected individual does not point up a system of suppressed political
advocacy that would be unconstitutional under Buckley. The District
Court’s conclusions and the supporting evidence also suffice to answer
respondents’ variant claim that the Missouri limits today differ in kind
from Buckley’s owing to inflation since that case was decided. Re-
spondents’ assumption that Buckley set a minimum constitutional
threshold for contribution limits, which in dollars adjusted for loss of
purchasing power are now well above the lines drawn by Missouri, is a
fundamental misunderstanding of that case. The Court there specifi-
cally rejected the contention that $1,000, or any other amount, was a
constitutional minimum, and instead asked whether the contribution
limitation was so low as to impede the ability of candidates to amass the
resources necessary for effective advocacy. 424 U. S., at 21. Such
being the test, the issue in subsequent cases cannot be truncated to a
narrow question about the power of the dollar. Pp. 395–397.
161 F. 3d 519, reversed and remanded.
Souter, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist,
C. J., and Stevens, O’Connor, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., joined.
Stevens, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 398. Breyer, J., filed a
concurring opinion, in which Ginsburg, J., joined, post, p. 399. Kennedy,
J., filed a dissenting opinion, post, p. 405. Thomas, J., filed a dissenting
opinion, in which Scalia, J., joined, post, p. 410.
Jeremiah W. Nixon, Attorney General of Missouri, pro se,
argued the cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs
were James R. Layton, State Solicitor, Paul R. Maguffee,
Assistant Attorney General, Carter G. Phillips, Virginia A.
Seitz, and Joseph R. Guerra.
Solicitor General Waxman argued the cause for the
United States as amicus curiae urging reversal. With him
on the brief were Acting Assistant Attorney General Ogden,
Deputy Solicitor General Underwood, Malcolm L. Stewart,
Douglas N. Letter, and Michael Jay Singer.
D. Bruce La Pierre argued the cause for respondents.
With him on the briefs for respondents Shrink Missouri Gov-
ernment PAC et al. was Patric Lester. Deborah Goldberg,

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Opinion of the Court
Burt Neuborne, and Gerald P. Greiman filed briefs for Joan
Bray as respondent under this Court’s Rule 12.6.*
Justice Souter delivered the opinion of the Court.
The principal issues in this case are whether Buckley v.
Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (1976) (per curiam), is authority for state
limits on contributions to state political candidates and
*Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the State of Ohio
et al. by Betty D. Montgomery, Attorney General of Ohio, Edward B.
Foley, State Solicitor, David M. Gormley, Iver A. Stridiron, Acting Attor-
ney General of the U. S. Virgin Islands, and by the Attorneys General
for their respective States as follows: Barbara Ritchie of Alaska, Janet
Napolitano of Arizona, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Ken Salazar of Colo-
rado, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, M. Jane Brady of Delaware,
Robert A. Butterworth of Florida, Margery S. Bronster of Hawaii, Alan
G. Lance of Idaho, Jeffrey A. Modisett of Indiana, Thomas J. Miller of
Iowa, Carla J. Stovall of Kansas, Albert B. Chandler III of Kentucky,
Richard P. Ieyoub of Louisiana, Andrew Ketterer of Maine, J. Joseph Cur-
ran, Jr., of Maryland, Thomas F. Reilly of Massachusetts, Mike Hatch of
Minnesota, Joseph P. Mazurek of Montana, Patricia A. Madrid of New
Mexico, Eliot Spitzer of New York, Michael F. Easley of North Carolina,
W. A. Drew Edmondson of Oklahoma, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Is-
land, Paul G. Summers of Tennessee, Jan Graham of Utah, William H.
Sorrell of Vermont, and Christine O. Gregoire of Washington; for Common
Cause et al. by Roger M. Witten, Daniel H. Squire, Donald J. Simon, and
Fred Wertheimer; for Public Citizen by Alan B. Morrison and David C.
Vladeck; for the Secretary of State of Arkansas et al. by Gregory Luke,
John C. Bonifaz, and Brenda Wright; for Senator John F. Reed et al. by
Donald B. Verrilli, Jr., Deanne E. Maynard, and Gregory P. Magarian;
for Paul Allen Beck et al. by Evan A. Davis; and for Norman Dorsen et al.
by Charles S. Sims.
Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the American
Civil Liberties Union et al. by Joel M. Gora and Steven R. Shapiro; for
the First Amendment Project of the Americans Back in Charge Founda-
tion et al. by Cleta D. Mitchell and Paul E. Sullivan; for Gun Owners of
America et al. by William J. Olson and John S. Miles; for the James
Madison Center for Free Speech by James Bopp, Jr.; for the National
Right to Life PAC State Fund et al. by Mr. Bopp; for the Pacific Legal
Foundation et al. by Sharon L. Browne; for Senator Mitch McConnell et al.
by Bobby R. Burchfield; and for U. S. Term Limits, Inc., by Stephen J.
Safranek.

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whether the federal limits approved in Buckley, with or
without adjustment for inflation, define the scope of permis-
sible state limitations today. We hold Buckley to be author-
ity for comparable state regulation, which need not be
pegged to Buckley’s dollars.
I
In 1994, the Legislature of Missouri enacted Senate Bill
650 to restrict the permissible amounts of contributions to
candidates for state office. Mo. Rev. Stat. § 130.032 (1994).
Before the statute became effective, however, Missouri vot-
ers approved a ballot initiative with even stricter contribu-
tion limits, effective immediately. The United States Court
of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit then held the initiative’s
contribution limits unconstitutional under the First Amend-
ment, Carver v. Nixon, 72 F. 3d 633, 645 (CA8 1995), cert.
denied, 518 U. S. 1033 (1996), with the upshot that the pre-
viously dormant 1994 statute took effect. Shrink Missouri
Government PAC v. Adams, 161 F. 3d 519, 520 (CA8 1998).
As amended in 1997, that statute imposes contribution lim-
its ranging from $250 to $1,000, depending on specified state
office or size of constituency. See Mo. Rev. Stat. § 130.032.1
(1998 Cum. Supp.); 161 F. 3d, at 520. The particular provi-
sion challenged here reads that
“[t]o elect an individual to the office of governor, lieuten-
ant governor, secretary of state, state treasurer, state
auditor or attorney general, [[t]he amount of contribu-
tions made by or accepted from any person other than
the candidate in any one election shall not exceed] one
thousand dollars.” Mo. Rev. Stat. § 130.032.1(1) (1998
Cum. Supp.).
The statutory dollar amounts are baselines for an adjust-
ment each even-numbered year, to be made “by multiplying
the base year amount by the cumulative consumer price

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index . . . and rounded to the nearest twenty-five-dollar
amount, for all years since January 1, 1995.” § 130.032.2.
When this suit was filed, the limits ranged from a high of
$1,075 for contributions to candidates for statewide office (in-
cluding state auditor) and for any office where the population
exceeded 250,000, down to $275 for contributions to candi-
dates for state representative or for any office for which
there were fewer than 100,000 people represented. 161
F. 3d, at 520; App. 37.
Respondents Shrink Missouri Government PAC, a political
action committee, and Zev David Fredman, a candidate for
the 1998 Republican nomination for state auditor, sought to
enjoin enforcement of the contribution statute 1 as violating
their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights (presumably
those of free speech, association, and equal protection, al-
though the complaint did not so state). Shrink Missouri
gave $1,025 to Fredman’s candidate committee in 1997, and
another $50 in 1998. Shrink Missouri represented that,
without the limitation, it would contribute more to the
Fredman campaign. Fredman alleged he could campaign
effectively only with more generous contributions than
§ 130.032.1 allowed. Shrink Missouri Government PAC v.
Adams, 5 F. Supp. 2d 734, 737 (ED Mo. 1998).
On cross-motions for summary judgment, the District
Court sustained the statute. Id., at 742. Applying Buck-
ley v. Valeo, supra, the court found adequate support for the
law in the proposition that large contributions raise suspi-
cions of influence peddling tending to undermine citizens’
confidence “in the integrity of . . . government.” 5 F. Supp.
2d, at 738. The District Court rejected respondents’ con-
1 Respondents sued members of the Missouri Ethics Commission, the
Missouri attorney general, and the St. Louis County prosecuting attorney.
Shrink Missouri Government PAC v. Adams, 5 F. Supp. 2d 734, 737 (ED
Mo. 1998).

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tention that inflation since Buckley’s approval of a federal
$1,000 restriction meant that the state limit of $1,075 for a
statewide office could not be constitutional today. 5 F. Supp.
2d, at 740.
The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit nonetheless
enjoined enforcement of the law pending appeal, 151 F. 3d
763, 765 (1998), and ultimately reversed the District Court,
161 F. 3d, at 520. Finding that Buckley had “ ‘articulated
and applied a strict scrutiny standard of review,’ ” the Court
of Appeals held that Missouri was bound to demonstrate
“that it has a compelling interest and that the contribution
limits at issue are narrowly drawn to serve that interest.”
161 F. 3d, at 521 (quoting Carver v. Nixon, supra, at 637).
The appeals court treated Missouri’s claim of a compelling
interest “in avoiding the corruption or the perception of cor-
ruption brought about when candidates for elective office ac-
cept large campaign contributions” as insufficient by itself to
satisfy strict scrutiny. 161 F. 3d, at 521–522. Relying on
Circuit precedent, see Russell v. Burris, 146 F. 3d 563, 568
(CA8), cert. denied, 525 U. S. 1001 (1998); Carver v. Nixon,
supra, at 638, the Court of Appeals required
“some demonstrable evidence that there were genuine
problems that resulted from contributions in amounts
greater than the limits in place. . . .
“[T]he Buckley Court noted the perfidy that had been
uncovered in federal campaign financing in 1972. . . .
But we are unwilling to extrapolate from those exam-
ples that in Missouri at this time there is corruption or
a perception of corruption from ‘large’ campaign contri-
butions, without some evidence that such problems
really exist.” 161 F. 3d, at 521–522 (citations omitted).
The court thought that the only evidence presented by the
State, an affidavit from the cochairman of the state legisla-
ture’s Interim Joint Committee on Campaign Finance Re-
form when the statute was passed, was inadequate to raise

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a genuine issue of material fact about the State’s alleged
interest in limiting campaign contributions. Ibid.2
Given the large number of States that limit political con-
tributions, see generally Federal Election Commission, E.
Feigenbaum & J. Palmer, Campaign Finance Law 98 (1998),
we granted certiorari to review the congruence of the Eighth
Circuit’s decision with Buckley. 525 U. S. 1121 (1999). We
reverse.
II
The matters raised in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (1976)
(per curiam), included claims that federal campaign finance
legislation infringed speech and association protections of
the First Amendment and the equal protection guarantee of
the Fifth. The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, 86
Stat. 3, as amended by the Federal Election Campaign Act
Amendments of 1974, 88 Stat. 1263, limited (and still limits)
contributions by individuals to any single candidate for fed-
eral office to $1,000 per election. 18 U. S. C. §§ 608(b)(1), (3)
(1970 ed., Supp. IV); Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 13. Until
Buckley struck it down, the law also placed a $1,000 annual
ceiling on independent expenditures linked to specific candi-
dates. 18 U. S. C. § 608(e) (1970 ed., Supp. IV); 424 U. S.,
at 13. We found violations of the First Amendment in the
expenditure regulations, but held the contribution restric-
tions constitutional. Buckley v. Valeo, supra.
2 Chief Judge Bowman also would have found the law invalid because
the contribution limits were severely tailored beyond any need to serve
the State’s interest. Comparing the Missouri limits with those considered
in Buckley, the Chief Judge said that “[a]fter inflation, limits of $1,075,
$525, and $275 cannot compare with the $1,000 limit approved in Buckley
twenty-two years ago,” and “can only be regarded as ‘too low to allow
meaningful participation in protected political speech and association.’ ”
161 F. 3d, at 522–523 (quoting Day v. Holahan, 34 F. 3d 1356, 1366 (CA8
1994), cert. denied, 513 U. S. 1127 (1995)). Judge Ross, concurring in the
judgment, did not join this portion of Chief Judge Bowman’s opinion. 161
F. 3d, at 523.
Judge Gibson dissented from the panel’s decision. Ibid.

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A
Precision about the relative rigor of the standard to review
contribution limits was not a pretense of the Buckley per
curiam opinion. To be sure, in addressing the speech claim,
we explicitly rejected both O’Brien intermediate scrutiny
for communicative action, see United States v. O’Brien, 391
U. S. 367 (1968), and the similar standard applicable to
merely time, place, and manner restrictions, see Adderley v.
Florida, 385 U. S. 39 (1966); Cox v. Louisiana, 379 U. S. 536
(1965); Kovacs v. Cooper, 336 U. S. 77 (1949). In distinguish-
ing these tests, the discussion referred generally to “the ex-
acting scrutiny required by the First Amendment,” Buckley
v. Valeo, 424 U. S., at 16, and added that “ ‘the constitutional
guarantee has its fullest and most urgent application pre-
cisely to the conduct of campaigns for political office,’ ” id.,
at 15 (quoting Monitor Patriot Co. v. Roy, 401 U. S. 265,
272 (1971)).
We then, however, drew a line between expenditures and
contributions, treating expenditure restrictions as direct
restraints on speech, 424 U. S., at 19, which nonetheless suf-
fered little direct effect from contribution limits:
“[A] limitation upon the amount that any one person or
group may contribute to a candidate or political commit-
tee entails only a marginal restriction upon the contribu-
tor’s ability to engage in free communication. A contri-
bution serves as a general expression of support for the
candidate and his views, but does not communicate the
underlying basis for the support. The quantity of com-
munication by the contributor does not increase percep-
tibly with the size of his contribution, since the expres-
sion rests solely on the undifferentiated symbolic act of
contributing. At most, the size of the contribution pro-
vides a very rough index of the intensity of the contribu-
tor’s support for the candidate. A limitation on the
amount of money a person may give to a candidate or

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campaign organization thus involves little direct re-
straint on his political communication, for it permits the
symbolic expression of support evidenced by a contribu-
tion but does not in any way infringe the contributor’s
freedom to discuss candidates and issues.” Id., at 20–21
(footnote omitted).
We thus said, in effect, that limiting contributions left com-
munication significantly unimpaired.
We flagged a similar difference between expenditure and
contribution limitations in their impacts on the association
right. While an expenditure limit “precludes most associa-
tions from effectively amplifying the voice of their adher-
ents,” id., at 22 (thus interfering with the freedom of the
adherents as well as the association, ibid.), the contribution
limits “leave the contributor free to become a member of any
political association and to assist personally in the associa-
tion’s efforts on behalf of candidates,” ibid.; see also id., at
28. While we did not then say in so many words that differ-
ent standards might govern expenditure and contribution
limits affecting associational rights, we have since then said
so explicitly in Federal Election Comm’n v. Massachusetts
Citizens for Life, Inc., 479 U. S. 238, 259–260 (1986): “We
have consistently held that restrictions on contributions re-
quire less compelling justification than restrictions on inde-
pendent spending.” It has, in any event, been plain ever
since Buckley that contribution limits would more readily
clear the hurdles before them. Cf. Colorado Republican
Federal Campaign Comm. v. Federal Election Comm’n, 518
U. S. 604, 610 (1996) (opinion of Breyer, J.) (noting that in
campaign finance case law, “[t]he provisions that the Court
found constitutional mostly imposed contribution limits”
(emphasis in original)). Thus, under Buckley’s standard of
scrutiny, a contribution limit involving “significant interfer-
ence” with associational rights, 424 U. S., at 25 (internal quo-
tation marks omitted), could survive if the Government dem-
onstrated that contribution regulation was “closely drawn”

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to match a “sufficiently important interest,” ibid., though the
dollar amount of the limit need not be “fine tun[ed],” id.,
at 30.3
While we did not attempt to parse distinctions between
the speech and association standards of scrutiny for contribu-
tion limits, we did make it clear that those restrictions bore
more heavily on the associational right than on freedom to
speak. Id., at 24–25. We consequently proceeded on the
understanding that a contribution limitation surviving a
claim of associational abridgment would survive a speech
challenge as well, and we held the standard satisfied by the
contribution limits under review.
“[T]he prevention of corruption and the appearance of
corruption” was found to be a “constitutionally sufficient
justification,” id., at 25–26:
“To the extent that large contributions are given to se-
cure a political quid pro quo from current and potential
office holders, the integrity of our system of representa-
tive democracy is undermined. . . .
“Of almost equal concern as the danger of actual quid
pro quo arrangements is the impact of the appearance
of corruption stemming from public awareness of the op-
portunities for abuse inherent in a regime of large indi-
vidual financial contributions. . . . Congress could legiti-
3 The quoted language addressed the correlative overbreadth challenge.
On the point of classifying the standard of scrutiny, compare Roberts v.
United States Jaycees, 468 U. S. 609, 623 (1984) (“Infringements on [the
right to associate for expressive purposes] may be justified by regulations
adopted to serve compelling state interests, unrelated to the suppression
of ideas, that cannot be achieved through means significantly less restric-
tive of associational freedoms”); NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 438
(1963) (“The decisions of this Court have consistently held that only a
compelling state interest in the regulation of a subject within the State’s
constitutional power to regulate can justify limiting First Amendment
freedoms”); NAACP v. Alabama ex rel. Patterson, 357 U. S. 449, 460–461
(1958) (“[S]tate action which may have the effect of curtailing the freedom
to associate is subject to the closest scrutiny”).

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mately conclude that the avoidance of the appearance of
improper influence ‘is also critical . . . if confidence in
the system of representative Government is not to be
eroded to a disastrous extent.’ ” Id., at 26–27 (quoting
Civil Service Comm’n v. Letter Carriers, 413 U. S. 548,
565 (1973)).
See also Federal Election Comm’n v. National Conservative
Political Action Comm., 470 U. S. 480, 497 (1985) (“Corrup-
tion is a subversion of the political process. Elected officials
are influenced to act contrary to their obligations of office by
the prospect of financial gain to themselves or infusions of
money into their campaigns”); Federal Election Comm’n v.
National Right to Work Comm., 459 U. S. 197, 208 (1982)
(noting that Government interests in preventing corruption
or the appearance of corruption “directly implicate ‘the in-
tegrity of our electoral process, and, not less, the responsibil-
ity of the individual citizen for the successful functioning of
that process’ ” (quoting United States v. Automobile Work-
ers, 352 U. S. 567, 570 (1957))); First Nat. Bank of Boston v.
Bellotti, 435 U. S. 765, 788, n. 26 (1978) (“The importance of
the governmental interest in preventing [corruption] has
never been doubted”).
In speaking of “improper influence” and “opportunities for
abuse” in addition to “quid pro quo arrangements,” we rec-
ognized a concern not confined to bribery of public officials,
but extending to the broader threat from politicians too com-
pliant with the wishes of large contributors. These were
the obvious points behind our recognition that the Congress
could constitutionally address the power of money “to influ-
ence governmental action” in ways less “blatant and specific”
than bribery. Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S., at 28.4
4 In arguing that the Buckley standard should not be relaxed, respond-
ents Shrink Missouri and Fredman suggest that a candidate like Fredman
suffers because contribution limits favor incumbents over challengers.
Brief for Respondents Shrink Missouri Government PAC et al. 23–24.
This is essentially an equal protection claim, which Buckley squarely

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B
In defending its own statute, Missouri espouses those
same interests of preventing corruption and the appearance
of it that flows from munificent campaign contributions.
Even without the authority of Buckley, there would be no
serious question about the legitimacy of the interests
claimed, which, after all, underlie bribery and antigratuity
statutes. While neither law nor morals equate all political
contributions, without more, with bribes, we spoke in Buck-
ley of the perception of corruption “inherent in a regime of
large individual financial contributions” to candidates for
public office, id., at 27, as a source of concern “almost equal”
to quid pro quo improbity, ibid. The public interest in coun-
tering that perception was, indeed, the entire answer to the
overbreadth claim raised in the Buckley case. Id., at 30.
This made perfect sense. Leave the perception of impropri-
ety unanswered, and the cynical assumption that large do-
nors call the tune could jeopardize the willingness of voters
to take part in democratic governance. Democracy works
“only if the people have faith in those who govern, and that
faith is bound to be shattered when high officials and their
appointees engage in activities which arouse suspicions of
malfeasance and corruption.” United States v. Mississippi
Valley Generating Co., 364 U. S. 520, 562 (1961).
Although respondents neither challenge the legitimacy of
these objectives nor call for any reconsideration of Buckley,
they take the State to task, as the Court of Appeals did,
for failing to justify the invocation of those interests with
empirical evidence of actually corrupt practices or of a per-
faced. We found no support for the proposition that an incumbent’s ad-
vantages were leveraged into something significantly more powerful by
contribution limitations applicable to all candidates, whether veterans or
upstarts, 424 U. S., at 31–35. Since we do not relax Buckley’s standard,
no more need be said about respondents’ argument, though we note that
nothing in the record here gives respondents a stronger argument than
the Buckley petitioners made.

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ception among Missouri voters that unrestricted contribu-
tions must have been exerting a covertly corrosive influence.
The state statute is not void, however, for want of evidence.
The quantum of empirical evidence needed to satisfy
heightened judicial scrutiny of legislative judgments will
vary up or down with the novelty and plausibility of the jus-
tification raised. Buckley demonstrates that the dangers of
large, corrupt contributions and the suspicion that large con-
tributions are corrupt are neither novel nor implausible.
The opinion noted that “the deeply disturbing examples sur-
facing after the 1972 election demonstrate that the problem
[of corruption] is not an illusory one.” 424 U. S., at 27, and
n. 28. Although we did not ourselves marshal the evidence
in support of the congressional concern, we referred to “a
number of the abuses” detailed in the Court of Appeals’s
decision, ibid., which described how corporations, well-
financed interest groups, and rich individuals had made large
contributions, some of which were illegal under existing law,
others of which reached at least the verge of bribery. See
Buckley v. Valeo, 519 F. 2d 821, 839–840, and nn. 36–38
(CADC 1975). The evidence before the Court of Appeals
described public revelations by the parties in question more
than sufficient to show why voters would tend to identify a
big donation with a corrupt purpose.
While Buckley’s evidentiary showing exemplifies a suffi-
cient justification for contribution limits, it does not speak to
what may be necessary as a minimum.5 As to that, respond-
5 Cf. Federal Election Comm’n v. National Right to Work Comm., 459
U. S. 197, 210 (1982) (“Nor will we second-guess a legislative determina-
tion as to the need for prophylactic measures where corruption is the evil
feared”); First Nat. Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U. S. 765, 788, n. 26
(1978); California Medical Assn. v. Federal Election Comm’n, 453 U. S.
182, 194–195 (1981) (noting that Buckley held that contribution limits
“served the important governmental interests in preventing the corrup-
tion or appearance of corruption of the political process that might result if
such contributions were not restrained”); Citizens Against Rent Control/
Coalition for Fair Housing v. Berkeley, 454 U. S. 290, 296–297 (1981)

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ents are wrong in arguing that in the years since Buckley
came down we have “supplemented” its holding with a new
requirement that governments enacting contribution limits
must “ ‘demonstrate that the recited harms are real, not
merely conjectural,’ ” Brief for Respondents Shrink Missouri
Government PAC et al. 26 (quoting United States v. Treas-
ury Employees, 513 U. S. 454, 475 (1995) (in turn quoting
Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC, 512 U. S. 622, 664
(1994))), a contention for which respondents rely principally
on Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm. v. Fed-
eral Election Comm’n, 518 U. S. 604 (1996). We have never
accepted mere conjecture as adequate to carry a First
Amendment burden, and Colorado Republican did not deal
with a government’s burden to justify limits on contribu-
tions. Although the principal opinion in that case charged
the Government with failure to show a real risk of corrup-
tion, id., at 616 (opinion of Breyer, J.), the issue in question
was limits on independent expenditures by political parties,
which the principal opinion expressly distinguished from
contribution limits: “limitations on independent expendi-
tures are less directly related to preventing corruption” than
contributions are, id., at 615. In that case, the “constitution-
ally significant fact” that there was no “coordination between
the candidate and the source of the expenditure” kept the
principal opinion “from assuming, absent convincing evi-
dence to the contrary, that [a limitation on expenditures] is
necessary to combat a substantial danger of corruption of the
(“Buckley identified a single narrow exception to the rule that limits on
political activity were contrary to the First Amendment. The exception
relates to the perception of undue influence of large contributors to a can-
didate”); see also Federal Election Comm’n v. National Conservative Po-
litical Action Comm., 470 U. S. 480, 500 (1985) (observing that Buckley
upheld contribution limits as constitutional, and noting the Court’s “defer-
ence to a congressional determination of the need for a prophylactic rule
where the evil of potential corruption had long been recognized”).

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electoral system.” Id., at 617–618. Colorado Republican
thus goes hand in hand with Buckley, not toe to toe.
In any event, this case does not present a close call requir-
ing further definition of whatever the State’s evidentiary ob-
ligation may be. While the record does not show that the
Missouri Legislature relied on the evidence and findings ac-
cepted in Buckley,6 the evidence introduced into the record
by petitioners or cited by the lower courts in this action and
the action regarding Proposition A is enough to show that
the substantiation of the congressional concerns reflected in
Buckley has its counterpart supporting the Missouri law.
Although Missouri does not preserve legislative history, 5
F. Supp. 2d, at 738, the State presented an affidavit from
State Senator Wayne Goode, the co-chair of the state legisla-
ture’s Interim Joint Committee on Campaign Finance Re-
form at the time the State enacted the contribution limits,
who stated that large contributions have “ ‘the real potential
to buy votes,’ ” ibid.; App. 47. The District Court cited
newspaper accounts of large contributions supporting infer-
ences of impropriety. 5 F. Supp. 2d, at 738, n. 6. One re-
port questioned the state treasurer’s decision to use a cer-
tain bank for most of Missouri’s banking business after that
institution contributed $20,000 to the treasurer’s campaign.
Editorial, The Central Issue is Trust, St. Louis Post-
Dispatch, Dec. 31, 1993, p. 6C. Another made much of the
receipt by a candidate for state auditor of a $40,000 contribu-
tion from a brewery and one for $20,000 from a bank. J.
Mannies, Auditor Race May Get Too Noisy to be Ignored,
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Sept. 11, 1994, at 4B. In Carver v.
Nixon, 72 F. 3d 633 (1995), the Eighth Circuit itself, while
6 Cf. Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc., 475 U. S. 41, 51–52 (1986) (“The
First Amendment does not require a city, before enacting . . . an ordinance,
to conduct new studies or produce evidence independent of that already
generated by other cities, so long as whatever evidence the city relies
upon is reasonably believed to be relevant to the problem that the city
addresses”).

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invalidating the limits Proposition A imposed, identified a
$420,000 contribution to candidates in northern Missouri
from a political action committee linked to an investment
bank, and three scandals, including one in which a state rep-
resentative was “accused of sponsoring legislation in ex-
change for kickbacks,” and another in which Missouri’s for-
mer attorney general pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy
to misuse state property, id., at 642, and n. 10, after being
indicted for using a state workers’ compensation fund to ben-
efit campaign contributors. And although majority votes do
not, as such, defeat First Amendment protections, the state-
wide vote on Proposition A certainly attested to the percep-
tion relied upon here: “[A]n overwhelming 74 percent of the
voters of Missouri determined that contribution limits are
necessary to combat corruption and the appearance thereof.”
Carver v. Nixon, 882 F. Supp. 901, 905 (WD Mo.), rev’d, 72
F. 3d 633 (CA8 1995); see also 5 F. Supp. 2d, at 738, n. 7.
There might, of course, be need for a more extensive evi-
dentiary documentation if respondents had made any show-
ing of their own to cast doubt on the apparent implications
of Buckley’s evidence and the record here, but the closest
respondents come to challenging these conclusions is their
invocation of academic studies said to indicate that large con-
tributions to public officials or candidates do not actually re-
sult in changes in candidates’ positions. Brief for Respond-
ents Shrink Missouri Government PAC et al. 41; Smith,
Money Talks: Speech, Corruption, Equality, and Campaign
Finance, 86 Geo. L. J. 45, 58 (1997); Smith, Faulty Assump-
tions and Undemocratic Consequences of Campaign Finance
Reform, 105 Yale L. J. 1049, 1067–1068 (1995). Other stud-
ies, however, point the other way. Reply Brief for Respond-
ent Bray 4–5; F. Sorauf, Inside Campaign Finance 169 (1992);
Hall & Wayman, Buying Time: Moneyed Interests and the
Mobilization of Bias in Congressional Committees, 84 Am.
Pol. Sci. Rev. 797 (1990); D. Magleby & C. Nelson, The Money
Chase 78 (1990). Given the conflict among these publica-

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tions, and the absence of any reason to think that public per-
ception has been influenced by the studies cited by respond-
ents, there is little reason to doubt that sometimes large
contributions will work actual corruption of our political
system, and no reason to question the existence of a corre-
sponding suspicion among voters.
C
Nor do we see any support for respondents’ various argu-
ments that in spite of their striking resemblance to the limi-
tations sustained in Buckley, those in Missouri are so differ-
ent in kind as to raise essentially a new issue about the
adequacy of the Missouri statute’s tailoring to serve its pur-
poses.7 Here, as in Buckley, “[t]here is no indication . . .
that the contribution limitations imposed by the [law] would
have any dramatic[ally] adverse effect on the funding of cam-
paigns and political associations,” and thus no showing that
7 Two of respondents’ amici raise the different argument, that contribu-
tion limits are insufficiently narrow, in the light of disclosure requirements
and bribery laws as less restrictive mechanisms for dealing with quid pro
quo threats and apprehensions. Brief for Pacific Legal Foundation et al.
as Amici Curiae 23–29. We specifically rejected this notion in Buckley
v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (1976) (per curiam), where we said that antibribery
laws “deal with only the most blatant and specific attempts of those with
money to influence government action,” and that “Congress was surely
entitled to conclude that disclosure was only a partial measure, and that
contribution ceilings were a necessary legislative concomitant to deal with
the reality or appearance of corruption inherent in a system permitting
unlimited financial contributions, even when the identities of the contribu-
tors and the amounts of their contributions are fully disclosed.” Id., at
28. We understood contribution limits, on the other hand, to “focu[s] pre-
cisely on the problem of large campaign contributions—the narrow aspect
of political association where the actuality and potential for corruption
have been identified—while leaving persons free to engage in independent
political expression, to associate actively through volunteering their serv-
ices, and to assist to a limited but nonetheless substantial extent in sup-
porting candidates and committees with financial resources.” Ibid.
There is no reason to view contribution limits any differently today.

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“the limitations prevented candidates and political commit-
tees from amassing the resources necessary for effective ad-
vocacy.” 424 U. S., at 21. The District Court found here
that in the period since the Missouri limits became effective,
“candidates for state elected office [have been] quite able to
raise funds sufficient to run effective campaigns,” 5 F. Supp.
2d, at 740, and that “candidates for political office in the state
are still able to amass impressive campaign war chests,” id.,
at 741.8 The plausibility of these conclusions is buttressed
by petitioners’ evidence that in the 1994 Missouri elections
(before any relevant state limitations went into effect), 97.62
percent of all contributors to candidates for state auditor
made contributions of $2,000 or less. Ibid.; App. 34–36.9
Even if we were to assume that the contribution limits af-
fected respondent Fredman’s ability to wage a competitive
campaign (no small assumption given that Fredman only
identified one contributor, Shrink Missouri, that would have
given him more than $1,075 per election), a showing of one
affected individual does not point up a system of suppressed
political advocacy that would be unconstitutional under
Buckley.
These conclusions of the District Court and the supporting
evidence also suffice to answer respondents’ variant claim
that the Missouri limits today differ in kind from Buckley’s
owing to inflation since 1976. Respondents seem to assume
that Buckley set a minimum constitutional threshold for con-
tribution limits, which in dollars adjusted for loss of purchas-
ing power are now well above the lines drawn by Missouri.
But this assumption is a fundamental misunderstanding of
what we held.
8 This case does not, however, involve any claim that the Missouri law
has restricted access to the ballot in any election other than that for
state auditor.
9 Similarly, data showed that less than 1.5 percent of the contributors to
candidates in the 1992 election for Missouri secretary of state made aggre-
gate contributions in excess of $2,000. 5 F. Supp. 2d, at 741; App. 35.

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In Buckley, we specifically rejected the contention that
$1,000, or any other amount, was a constitutional minimum
below which legislatures could not regulate. As indicated
above, we referred instead to the outer limits of contribution
regulation by asking whether there was any showing that
the limits were so low as to impede the ability of candidates
to “amas[s] the resources necessary for effective advocacy,”
424 U. S., at 21. We asked, in other words, whether the con-
tribution limitation was so radical in effect as to render polit-
ical association ineffective, drive the sound of a candidate’s
voice below the level of notice, and render contributions
pointless. Such being the test, the issue in later cases can-
not be truncated to a narrow question about the power of
the dollar, but must go to the power to mount a campaign
with all the dollars likely to be forthcoming. As Judge Gib-
son put it, the dictates of the First Amendment are not mere
functions of the Consumer Price Index. 161 F. 3d, at 525
(dissenting opinion).
D
The dissenters in this case think our reasoning evades the
real issue. Justice Thomas chides us for “hiding behind”
Buckley, post, at 422, and Justice Kennedy faults us for
seeing this case as “a routine application of our analysis” in
Buckley instead of facing up to what he describes as the
consequences of Buckley, post, at 405. Each dissenter
would overrule Buckley and thinks we should do the same.
The answer is that we are supposed to decide this case.
Shrink and Fredman did not request that Buckley be over-
ruled; the furthest reach of their arguments about the law
was that subsequent decisions already on the books had en-
hanced the State’s burden of justification beyond what Buck-
ley required, a proposition we have rejected as mistaken.
III
There is no reason in logic or evidence to doubt the suffi-
ciency of Buckley to govern this case in support of the Mis-

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souri statute. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is,
accordingly, reversed, and the case is remanded for proceed-
ings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice Stevens, concurring.
Justice Kennedy suggests that the misuse of soft money
tolerated by this Court’s misguided decision in Colorado
Republican Federal Campaign Comm. v. Federal Election
Comm’n, 518 U. S. 604 (1996), demonstrates the need for a
fresh examination of the constitutional issues raised by Con-
gress’ enactment of the Federal Election Campaign Acts of
1971 and 1974 and this Court’s resolution of those issues in
Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (1976) (per curiam). In re-
sponse to his call for a new beginning, therefore, I make one
simple point. Money is property; it is not speech.
Speech has the power to inspire volunteers to perform a
multitude of tasks on a campaign trail, on a battleground, or
even on a football field. Money, meanwhile, has the power
to pay hired laborers to perform the same tasks. It does
not follow, however, that the First Amendment provides the
same measure of protection to the use of money to accom-
plish such goals as it provides to the use of ideas to achieve
the same results.*
Our Constitution and our heritage properly protect the in-
dividual’s interest in making decisions about the use of his
or her own property. Governmental regulation of such deci-
sions can sometimes be viewed either as “deprivations of lib-
*Unless, of course, the prohibition entirely forecloses a channel of com-
munication, such as the use of paid petition circulators. See, e. g., Meyer
v. Grant, 486 U. S. 414, 424 (1988) (“Colorado’s prohibition of paid peti-
tion circulators restricts access to the most effective, fundamental, and
perhaps economical avenue of political discourse, direct one-on-one
communication. . . . The First Amendment protects appellees’ right not
only to advocate their cause but also to select what they believe to be the
most effective means for so doing”).

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erty” or as “deprivations of property,” see, e. g., Moore v.
East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494, 513 (1977) (Stevens, J., con-
curring in judgment). Telling a grandmother that she may
not use her own property to provide shelter to a grand-
child—or to hire mercenaries to work in that grandchild’s
campaign for public office—raises important constitutional
concerns that are unrelated to the First Amendment. Be-
cause I did not participate in the Court’s decision in Buckley,
I did not have the opportunity to suggest then that those
property and liberty concerns adequately explain the Court’s
decision to invalidate the expenditure limitations in the
1974 Act.
Reliance on the First Amendment to justify the invalida-
tion of campaign finance regulations is the functional equiva-
lent of the Court’s candid reliance on the doctrine of substan-
tive due process as articulated in the two prevailing opinions
in Moore v. East Cleveland. The right to use one’s own
money to hire gladiators, or to fund “speech by proxy,” cer-
tainly merits significant constitutional protection. These
property rights, however, are not entitled to the same pro-
tection as the right to say what one pleases.
Justice Breyer, with whom Justice Ginsburg joins,
concurring.
The dissenters accuse the Court of weakening the First
Amendment. They believe that failing to adopt a “strict
scrutiny” standard “balance[s] away First Amendment free-
doms.” Post, at 410 (opinion of Thomas, J.). But the prin-
cipal dissent oversimplifies the problem faced in the cam-
paign finance context. It takes a difficult constitutional
problem and turns it into a lopsided dispute between political
expression and government censorship. Under the cover of
this fiction and its accompanying formula, the dissent would
make the Court absolute arbiter of a difficult question best
left, in the main, to the political branches. I write sepa-

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Breyer, J., concurring
rately to address the critical question of how the Court ought
to review this kind of problem, and to explain why I believe
the Court’s choice here is correct.
If the dissent believes that the Court diminishes the im-
portance of the First Amendment interests before us, it is
wrong. The Court’s opinion does not question the constitu-
tional importance of political speech or that its protection
lies at the heart of the First Amendment. Nor does it ques-
tion the need for particularly careful, precise, and independ-
ent judicial review where, as here, that protection is at issue.
But this is a case where constitutionally protected interests
lie on both sides of the legal equation. For that reason there
is no place for a strong presumption against constitutionality,
of the sort often thought to accompany the words “strict
scrutiny.” Nor can we expect that mechanical application
of the tests associated with “strict scrutiny”—the tests of
“compelling interests” and “least restrictive means”—will
properly resolve the difficult constitutional problem that
campaign finance statutes pose. Cf. Kovacs v. Cooper, 336
U. S. 77, 96 (1949) (Frankfurter, J., concurring) (objecting, in
the First Amendment context, to “oversimplified formulas”);
see also Eu v. San Francisco County Democratic Central
Comm., 489 U. S. 214, 233–234 (1989) (Stevens, J., concur-
ring); Illinois Bd. of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party,
440 U. S. 173, 188–189 (1979) (Blackmun, J., concurring)
(same).
On the one hand, a decision to contribute money to a cam-
paign is a matter of First Amendment concern—not because
money is speech (it is not); but because it enables speech.
Through contributions the contributor associates himself
with the candidate’s cause, helps the candidate communicate
a political message with which the contributor agrees, and
helps the candidate win by attracting the votes of similarly
minded voters. Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 24–25 (1976)
(per curiam). Both political association and political com-
munication are at stake.

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On the other hand, restrictions upon the amount any one
individual can contribute to a particular candidate seek to
protect the integrity of the electoral process—the means
through which a free society democratically translates politi-
cal speech into concrete governmental action. See id., at
26–27; Burroughs v. United States, 290 U. S. 534, 545 (1934)
(upholding 1925 Federal Corrupt Practices Act by emphasiz-
ing constitutional importance of safeguarding the electoral
process); see also Burson v. Freeman, 504 U. S. 191, 199
(1992) (plurality opinion) (recognizing compelling interest
in preserving integrity of electoral process). Moreover, by
limiting the size of the largest contributions, such restric-
tions aim to democratize the influence that money itself may
bring to bear upon the electoral process. Cf. Reynolds v.
Sims, 377 U. S. 533, 565 (1964) (in the context of apportion-
ment, the Constitution “demands” that each citizen have “an
equally effective voice”). In doing so, they seek to build
public confidence in that process and broaden the base of
a candidate’s meaningful financial support, encouraging the
public participation and open discussion that the First
Amendment itself presupposes. See Mills v. Alabama, 384
U. S. 214, 218–219 (1966); Whitney v. California, 274 U. S.
357, 375–376 (1927) (Brandeis, J., concurring); A. Meiklejohn,
Free Speech and Its Relation to Self-Government 24–27
(1948).
In service of these objectives, the statute imposes restric-
tions of degree. It does not deny the contributor the oppor-
tunity to associate with the candidate through a contribution,
though it limits a contribution’s size. Nor does it prevent
the contributor from using money (alone or with others) to
pay for the expression of the same views in other ways. In-
stead, it permits all supporters to contribute the same
amount of money, in an attempt to make the process fairer
and more democratic.
Under these circumstances, a presumption against consti-
tutionality is out of place. I recognize that Buckley used

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language that could be interpreted to the contrary. It said,
for example, that it rejected “the concept that government
may restrict the speech of some elements of our society in
order to enhance the relative voice of others.” 424 U. S.,
at 48–49. But those words cannot be taken literally. The
Constitution often permits restrictions on the speech of some
in order to prevent a few from drowning out the many—
in Congress, for example, where constitutionally protected
debate, Art. I, § 6, is limited to provide every Member an
equal opportunity to express his or her views. Or in elec-
tions, where the Constitution tolerates numerous restric-
tions on ballot access, limiting the political rights of some so
as to make effective the political rights of the entire elector-
ate. See, e. g., Storer v. Brown, 415 U. S. 724, 736 (1974).
Regardless, as the result in Buckley made clear, the state-
ment does not automatically invalidate a statute that seeks
a fairer electoral debate through contribution limits, nor
should it forbid the Court to take account of the competing
constitutional interests just mentioned.
In such circumstances—where a law significantly impli-
cates competing constitutionally protected interests in com-
plex ways—the Court has closely scrutinized the statute’s
impact on those interests, but refrained from employing a
simple test that effectively presumes unconstitutionality.
Rather, it has balanced interests. And in practice that has
meant asking whether the statute burdens any one such in-
terest in a manner out of proportion to the statute’s salutary
effects upon the others (perhaps, but not necessarily, because
of the existence of a clearly superior, less restrictive alterna-
tive). Where a legislature has significantly greater institu-
tional expertise, as, for example, in the field of election regu-
lation, the Court in practice defers to empirical legislative
judgments—at least where that deference does not risk such
constitutional evils as, say, permitting incumbents to insulate
themselves from effective electoral challenge. This ap-
proach is that taken in fact by Buckley for contributions, and

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is found generally where competing constitutional interests
are implicated, such as privacy, see, e. g., Frisby v. Schultz,
487 U. S. 474, 485–488 (1988) (balancing rights of privacy and
expression); Rowan v. Post Office Dept., 397 U. S. 728, 736
(1970) (same), First Amendment interests of listeners or
viewers, see, e. g., Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC,
520 U. S. 180, 192–194 (1997) (recognizing the speech inter-
ests of both viewers and cable operators); Columbia Broad-
casting System, Inc. v. Democratic National Committee,
412 U. S. 94, 102–103 (1973) (“Balancing the various First
Amendment interests involved in the broadcast media . . . is
a task of a great delicacy and difficulty”); Red Lion Broad-
casting Co. v. FCC, 395 U. S. 367, 389–390 (1969) (First
Amendment permits the Federal Communications Commis-
sion to restrict the speech of some to enable the speech of
others), and the integrity of the electoral process, see, e. g.,
Burson, supra, at 198–211 (weighing First Amendment
rights against electoral integrity necessary for right to vote);
Anderson v. Celebrezze, 460 U. S. 780, 788–790 (1983) (same);
Storer v. Brown, supra, at 730 (“[T]here must be a substan-
tial regulation of elections if they are to be fair and honest”).
The approach taken by these cases is consistent with that of
other constitutional courts facing similarly complex constitu-
tional problems. See, e. g., Bowman v. United Kingdom, 26
Eur. Ct. H. R. 1 (European Comm’n of Human Rights 1998)
(demanding proportionality in the campaign finance context);
Libman v. Quebec (Attorney General), 151 D. L. R. (4th) 385
(Canada 1997) (same). For the dissenters to call the ap-
proach “sui generis,” post, at 410 (opinion of Thomas, J.),
overstates their case.
Applying this approach to the present case, I would uphold
the statute essentially for the reasons stated by the Court.
I agree that the legislature understands the problem—the
threat to electoral integrity, the need for democratization—
better than do we. We should defer to its political judgment
that unlimited spending threatens the integrity of the

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Breyer, J., concurring
electoral process. But we should not defer in respect
to whether its solution, by imposing too low a contribu-
tion limit, significantly increases the reputation-related or
media-related advantages of incumbency and thereby insu-
lates legislators from effective electoral challenge. The
statutory limit here, $1,075 (or 378, 1976 dollars), is low
enough to raise such a question. But given the empirical
information presented—the type of election at issue; the rec-
ord of adequate candidate financing postreform; and the fact
that the statute indexes the amount for inflation—I agree
with the Court that the statute does not work disproportion-
ate harm. The limit may have prevented the plaintiff, Zev
David Fredman, from financing his own campaign for office,
for Fredman’s support among potential contributors was not
sufficiently widespread. But any contribution statute (like
any statute setting ballot eligibility requirements, see, e. g.,
Jenness v. Fortson, 403 U. S. 431, 442 (1971)) will narrow
the field of conceivable challengers to some degree. Undue
insulation is a practical matter, and it cannot be inferred au-
tomatically from the fact that the limit makes ballot access
more difficult for one previously unsuccessful candidate.
The approach I have outlined here is consistent with the
approach this Court has taken in many complex First
Amendment cases. See supra, at 402–403. The Buckley
decision, as well, might be interpreted as embodying suffi-
cient flexibility for the problem at hand. After all, Buck-
ley’s holding seems to leave the political branches broad au-
thority to enact laws regulating contributions that take the
form of “soft money.” It held public financing laws constitu-
tional, 424 U. S., at 57, n. 65, 85–109. It says nothing one
way or the other about such important proposed reforms as
reduced-price media time. And later cases presuppose that
the Federal Election Commission has the delegated author-
ity to interpret broad statutory provisions in light of the
campaign finance law’s basic purposes, despite disagree-
ments over whether the Commission has exercised that au-

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405 Cite as: 528 U. S. 377 (2000)
Kennedy, J., dissenting
thority in a particular case. See Colorado Republican Fed-
eral Campaign Comm. v. Federal Election Comm’n, 518
U. S. 604, 619–621 (1996) (whether claimed “independent
expenditure” is a “coordinated expenditure”); accord, id., at
648–650 (Stevens, J., dissenting). Alternatively, it might
prove possible to reinterpret aspects of Buckley in light of
the post-Buckley experience stressed by Justice Kennedy,
post, at 406–409 (dissenting opinion), making less absolute
the contribution/expenditure line, particularly in respect
to independently wealthy candidates, whose expenditures
might be considered contributions to their own campaigns.
But what if I am wrong about Buckley? Suppose Buck-
ley denies the political branches sufficient leeway to enact
comprehensive solutions to the problems posed by campaign
finance. If so, like Justice Kennedy, I believe the Consti-
tution would require us to reconsider Buckley. With that
understanding I join the Court’s opinion.
Justice Kennedy, dissenting.
The Court’s decision has lasting consequences for political
speech in the course of elections, the speech upon which de-
mocracy depends. Yet in defining the controlling standard
of review and applying it to the urgent claim presented, the
Court seems almost indifferent. Its analysis would not be
acceptable for the routine case of a single protester with a
hand-scrawled sign, see City of Ladue v. Gilleo, 512 U. S. 43
(1994), a few demonstrators on a public sidewalk, see United
States v. Grace, 461 U. S. 171 (1983), or a driver who taped
over the motto on his license plate because he disagreed with
its message, see Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U. S. 705 (1977).
Surely the Court’s approach is unacceptable for a case an-
nouncing a rule that suppresses one of our most essential
and prevalent forms of political speech.
It would be no answer to say that this is a routine applica-
tion of our analysis in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (1976)
(per curiam), to a similar set of facts, so that a cavalier dis-

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Kennedy, J., dissenting
missal of respondents’ claim is appropriate. The justifica-
tions for the case system and stare decisis must rest upon
the Court’s capacity, and responsibility, to acknowledge its
missteps. It is our duty to face up to adverse, unintended
consequences flowing from our own prior decisions. With
all respect, I submit the Court does not accept this obligation
in the case before us. Instead, it perpetuates and com-
pounds a serious distortion of the First Amendment result-
ing from our own intervention in Buckley. The Court is
concerned about voter suspicion of the role of money in poli-
tics. Amidst an atmosphere of skepticism, however, it
hardly inspires confidence for the Court to abandon the rig-
ors of our traditional First Amendment structure.
I
Zev David Fredman asks us to evaluate his speech claim
in the context of a system which favors candidates and of-
ficeholders whose campaigns are supported by soft money,
usually funneled through political parties. The Court pays
him no heed. The plain fact is that the compromise the
Court invented in Buckley set the stage for a new kind of
speech to enter the political system. It is covert speech.
The Court has forced a substantial amount of political speech
underground, as contributors and candidates devise ever
more elaborate methods of avoiding contribution limits, lim-
its which take no account of rising campaign costs. The pre-
ferred method has been to conceal the real purpose of the
speech. Soft money may be contributed to political parties
in unlimited amounts, see Colorado Republican Federal
Campaign Comm. v. Federal Election Comm’n, 518 U. S.
604, 616 (1996), and is used often to fund so-called issue advo-
cacy, advertisements that promote or attack a candidate’s po-
sitions without specifically urging his or her election or de-
feat. Briffault, Issue Advocacy: Redrawing the Elections/
Politics Line, 77 Texas L. Rev. 1751, 1752–1753 (1999). Issue
advocacy, like soft money, is unrestricted, see Buckley,

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Kennedy, J., dissenting
supra, at 42–44, while straightforward speech in the form of
financial contributions paid to a candidate, speech subject to
full disclosure and prompt evaluation by the public, is not.
Thus has the Court’s decision given us covert speech. This
mocks the First Amendment. The current system would be
unfortunate, and suspect under the First Amendment, had it
evolved from a deliberate legislative choice; but its unhappy
origins are in our earlier decree in Buckley, which by accept-
ing half of what Congress did (limiting contributions) but
rejecting the other (limiting expenditures) created a mis-
shapen system, one which distorts the meaning of speech.
The irony that we would impose this regime in the name of
free speech ought to be sufficient ground to reject Buckley’s
wooden formula in the present case. The wrong goes
deeper, however. By operation of the Buckley rule, a candi-
date cannot oppose this system in an effective way without
selling out to it first. Soft money must be raised to attack
the problem of soft money. In effect, the Court immunizes
its own erroneous ruling from change. Rulings of this
Court must never be viewed with more caution than when
they provide immunity from their own correction in the po-
litical process and in the forum of unrestrained speech. The
melancholy history of campaign finance in Buckley’s wake
shows what can happen when we intervene in the dynamics
of speech and expression by inventing an artificial scheme of
our own.
The case in one sense might seem unimportant. It ap-
pears that Mr. Fredman was an outsider candidate who may
not have had much of a chance. Yet, by binding him to the
outdated limit of $1,075 per contribution in a system where
parties can raise soft money without limitation and a power-
ful press faces no restrictions on use of its own resources to
back its preferred candidates, the Court tells Mr. Fredman
he cannot challenge the status quo unless he first gives into
it. This is not the First Amendment with which I am
familiar.

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408 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
Kennedy, J., dissenting
To defend its extension of Buckley to present times, the
Court, of course, recites the dangers of corruption, or the
appearance of corruption, when an interested person contrib-
utes money to a candidate. What the Court does not do is
examine and defend the substitute it has encouraged, covert
speech funded by unlimited soft money. In my view that
system creates dangers greater than the one it has replaced.
The first danger is the one already mentioned: that we re-
quire contributors of soft money and its beneficiaries to mask
their real purpose. Second, we have an indirect system of
accountability that is confusing, if not dispiriting, to the
voter. The very disaffection or distrust that the Court cites
as the justification for limits on direct contributions has now
spread to the entire political discourse. Buckley has not
worked.
My colleagues in the majority, in my respectful submis-
sion, do much disservice to our First Amendment jurispru-
dence by failing to acknowledge or evaluate the whole opera-
tion of the system that we ourselves created in Buckley.
Our First Amendment principles surely tell us that an inter-
est thought to be the compelling reason for enacting a law is
cast into grave doubt when a worse evil surfaces in the law’s
actual operation. And our obligation to examine the opera-
tion of the law is all the more urgent when the new evil is
itself a distortion of speech. By these measures the law be-
fore us cannot pass any serious standard of First Amend-
ment review.
Among the facts the Court declines to take into account is
the emergence of cyberspace communication by which politi-
cal contributions can be reported almost simultaneously with
payment. The public can then judge for itself whether the
candidate or the officeholder has so overstepped that we no
longer trust him or her to make a detached and neutral judg-
ment. This is a far more immediate way to assess the integ-
rity and the performance of our leaders than through the
hidden world of soft money and covert speech.

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409 Cite as: 528 U. S. 377 (2000)
Kennedy, J., dissenting
Officeholders face a dilemma inherent in the democratic
process and one that has never been easy to resolve: how to
exercise their best judgment while soliciting the continued
support and loyalty of constituents whose interests may not
always coincide with that judgment. Edmund Burke cap-
tured the tension in his Speeches at Bristol. “Your repre-
sentative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment;
and he betrays instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to
your opinion.” E. Burke, Speeches of the Right Hon. Ed-
mund Burke 130 (J. Burke ed. 1867). Whether our office-
holders can discharge their duties in a proper way when they
are beholden to certain interests both for reelection and for
campaign support is, I should think, of constant concern not
alone to citizens but to conscientious officeholders them-
selves. There are no easy answers, but the Constitution re-
lies on one: open, robust, honest, unfettered speech that the
voters can examine and assess in an ever-changing and more
complex environment.
II
To this point my view may seem to be but a reflection of
what Justice Thomas has written, and to a large extent I
agree with his insightful and careful discussion of our prece-
dents. If an ensuing chapter must be written, I may well
come out as he does, for his reasoning and my own seem to
point to the conclusion that the legislature can do little by
way of imposing limits on political speech of this sort. For
now, however, I would leave open the possibility that Con-
gress, or a state legislature, might devise a system in which
there are some limits on both expenditures and contribu-
tions, thus permitting officeholders to concentrate their time
and efforts on official duties rather than on fundraising. For
the reasons I have sought to express, there are serious con-
stitutional questions to be confronted in enacting any such
scheme, but I would not foreclose it at the outset. I would
overrule Buckley and then free Congress or state legisla-
tures to attempt some new reform, if, based upon their own

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410 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
Thomas, J., dissenting
considered view of the First Amendment, it is possible to
do so. Until any reexamination takes place, however, the
existing distortion of speech caused by the halfway house
we created in Buckley ought to be eliminated. The First
Amendment ought to be allowed to take its own course with-
out further obstruction from the artificial system we have
imposed. It suffices here to say that the law in question
does not come even close to passing any serious scrutiny.
For these reasons, though I am in substantial agreement
with what Justice Thomas says in his opinion, I have
thought it necessary to file a separate dissent.
Justice Thomas, with whom Justice Scalia joins,
dissenting.
In the process of ratifying Missouri’s sweeping repression
of political speech, the Court today adopts the analytic falla-
cies of our flawed decision in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1
(1976) (per curiam). Unfortunately, the Court is not con-
tent to merely adhere to erroneous precedent. Under the
guise of applying Buckley, the Court proceeds to weaken
the already enfeebled constitutional protection that Buckley
afforded campaign contributions. In the end, the Court em-
ploys a sui generis test to balance away First Amendment
freedoms.
Because the Court errs with each step it takes, I dissent.
As I indicated in Colorado Republican Federal Campaign
Comm. v. Federal Election Comm’n, 518 U. S. 604, 635–644
(1996) (opinion concurring in judgment and dissenting in
part), our decision in Buckley was in error, and I would over-
rule it. I would subject campaign contribution limitations
to strict scrutiny, under which Missouri’s contribution limits
are patently unconstitutional.
I
I begin with a proposition that ought to be unassailable:
Political speech is the primary object of First Amendment

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411 Cite as: 528 U. S. 377 (2000)
Thomas, J., dissenting
protection. See, e. g., Mills v. Alabama, 384 U. S. 214, 218
(1966); Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 375 (1927)
(Brandeis, J., concurring); T. Cooley, Constitutional Limita-
tions *422; Z. Chafee, Free Speech in the United States 28
(1954); Bork, Neutral Principles and Some First Amendment
Problems, 47 Ind. L. J. 1, 20 (1971); Sunstein, Free Speech
Now, in The Bill of Rights in the Modern State 304–307 (G.
Stone, R. Epstein, & C. Sunstein eds. 1992). The Founders
sought to protect the rights of individuals to engage in politi-
cal speech because a self-governing people depends upon the
free exchange of political information. And that free ex-
change should receive the most protection when it matters
the most—during campaigns for elective office. “The value
and efficacy of [the right to elect the members of govern-
ment] depends on the knowledge of the comparative merits
and demerits of the candidates for public trust, and on the
equal freedom, consequently, of examining and discussing
these merits and demerits of the candidates respectively.”
Madison, Report on the Resolutions (1799), in 6 Writings of
James Madison 397 (G. Hunt ed. 1906).
I do not start with these foundational principles because
the Court openly disagrees with them—it could not, for they
are solidly embedded in our precedents. See, e. g., Eu v.
San Francisco County Democratic Central Comm., 489 U. S.
214, 223 (1989) (“[T]he First Amendment ‘has its fullest and
most urgent application’ to speech uttered during a cam-
paign for political office” (quoting Monitor Patriot Co. v.
Roy, 401 U. S. 265, 272 (1971))); Brown v. Hartlage, 456 U. S.
45, 53 (1982) (“The free exchange of ideas provides special
vitality to the process traditionally at the heart of American
constitutional democracy—the political campaign”); Garri-
son v. Louisiana, 379 U. S. 64, 74–75 (1964) (“[S]peech con-
cerning public affairs is . . . the essence of self-government”).
Instead, I start with them because the Court today abandons
them. For nearly half a century, this Court has extended
First Amendment protection to a multitude of forms of

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412 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
Thomas, J., dissenting
“speech,” such as making false defamatory statements, filing
lawsuits, dancing nude, exhibiting drive-in movies with nu-
dity, burning flags, and wearing military uniforms.1 Not
surprisingly, the Courts of Appeals have followed our lead
and concluded that the First Amendment protects, for exam-
ple, begging, shouting obscenities, erecting tables on a side-
walk, and refusing to wear a necktie.2 In light of the many
cases of this sort, today’s decision is a most curious anomaly.
Whatever the proper status of such activities under the First
Amendment, I am confident that they are less integral to
the functioning of our Republic than campaign contributions.
Yet the majority today, rather than going out of its way to
protect political speech, goes out of its way to avoid protect-
ing it. As I explain below, contributions to political cam-
paigns generate essential political speech. And contribution
caps, which place a direct and substantial limit on core
speech, should be met with the utmost skepticism and should
receive the strictest scrutiny.
II
At bottom, the majority’s refusal to apply strict scrutiny
to contribution limits rests upon Buckley’s discounting of the
First Amendment interests at stake. The analytic founda-
tion of Buckley, however, was tenuous from the very begin-
ning and has only continued to erode in the intervening
years. What remains of Buckley fails to provide an ade-
quate justification for limiting individual contributions to po-
litical candidates.
1 New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964); NAACP v. But-
ton, 371 U. S. 415 (1963); Barnes v. Glen Theatre, Inc., 501 U. S. 560 (1991)
(plurality opinion); Erznoznik v. Jacksonville, 422 U. S. 205 (1975); United
States v. Eichman, 496 U. S. 310 (1990); Schacht v. United States, 398 U. S.
58 (1970).
2 Loper v. New York City Police Dept., 999 F. 2d 699 (CA2 1993); Sandul
v. Larion, 119 F. 3d 1250 (CA6 1997); One World One Family Now v.
Miami Beach, 175 F. 3d 1282 (CA11 1999); East Hartford Education
Assoc. v. Board of Ed. of East Hartford, 562 F. 2d 838 (CA2 1977).

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Thomas, J., dissenting
A
To justify its decision upholding contribution limitations
while striking down expenditure limitations, the Court in
Buckley explained that expenditure limits “represent sub-
stantial rather than merely theoretical restraints on the
quantity and diversity of political speech,” 424 U. S., at 19,
while contribution limits “entai[l] only a marginal restriction
upon the contributor’s ability to engage in free communica-
tion,” id., at 20–21 (quoted ante, at 386). In drawing this
distinction, the Court in Buckley relied on the premise that
contributing to a candidate differs qualitatively from directly
spending money. It noted that “[w]hile contributions may
result in political expression if spent by a candidate or an
association to present views to the voters, the transforma-
tion of contributions into political debate involves speech by
someone other than the contributor.” 424 U. S., at 21. See
also California Medical Assn. v. Federal Election Comm’n,
453 U. S. 182, 196 (1981) (plurality opinion) (“[T]he ‘speech
by proxy’ that [a contributor] seeks to achieve through its
contributions . . . is not the sort of political advocacy that
this Court in Buckley found entitled to full First Amend-
ment protection”).
But this was a faulty distinction ab initio because it ig-
nored the reality of how speech of all kinds is disseminated:
“Even in the case of a direct expenditure, there is usu-
ally some go-between that facilitates the dissemination
of the spender’s message—for instance, an advertising
agency or a television station. To call a contribution
‘speech by proxy’ thus does little to differentiate it from
an expenditure. The only possible difference is that
contributions involve an extra step in the proxy chain.
But again, that is a difference in form, not substance.”
Colorado Republican, 518 U. S., at 638–639 (Thomas, J.,
concurring in judgment and dissenting in part) (cita-
tions omitted).

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Thomas, J., dissenting
And, inasmuch as the speech-by-proxy argument was discon-
nected from the realities of political speech to begin with, it
is not surprising that we have firmly rejected it since Buck-
ley. In Federal Election Comm’n v. National Conservative
Political Action Comm., 470 U. S. 480 (1985), we cast aside
the argument that a contribution does not represent the con-
stitutionally protected speech of a contributor, recognizing
“that the contributors obviously like the message they are
hearing from these organizations and want to add their
voices to that message; otherwise they would not part with
their money.” Id., at 495. Though in that case we consid-
ered limitations on expenditures made by associations, our
holding that the speech-by-proxy argument fails to diminish
contributors’ First Amendment rights is directly applicable
to this case. In both cases, donors seek to disseminate infor-
mation by giving to an organization controlled by others.
Through contributing, citizens see to it that their views on
policy and politics are articulated. In short, “they are
aware that however great the confidence they may justly feel
in their own good sense, their interests can be more effectu-
ally promoted by [another] than by themselves.” The Fed-
eralist No. 35, p. 214 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961) (A. Hamilton).
Without the assistance of the speech-by-proxy argument,
the remainder of Buckley’s rationales founder. Those ra-
tionales—that the “quantity of communication by the con-
tributor does not increase perceptibly with the size of his
contribution,” Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 21 (quoted ante, at
386), that “the size of the contribution provides a very rough
index of the intensity of the contributor’s support for the
candidate,” 424 U. S., at 21 (quoted ante, at 386), and that
“[a] contribution serves as a general expression of support
for the candidate and his views, but does not communicate
the underlying basis for the support,” 424 U. S., at 21 (quoted
ante, at 386)—still rest on the proposition that speech by
proxy is not fully protected. These contentions simply ig-

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Thomas, J., dissenting
nore that a contribution, by amplifying the voice of the candi-
date, helps to ensure the dissemination of the messages that
the contributor wishes to convey. Absent the ability to rest
on the denigration of contributions as mere “proxy speech,”
the arguments fall apart.3
The decision of individuals to speak through contributions
rather than through independent expenditures is entirely
reasonable.4 Political campaigns are largely candidate fo-
3 If one were to accept the speech-by-proxy point and consider a contri-
bution a mere symbolic gesture, Buckley’s auxiliary arguments still falter.
The claim that a large contribution receives less protection because it only
expresses the “intensity of the contributor’s support for the candidate,”
Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 21 (1976) (per curiam) (quoted ante, at 386),
fails under our jurisprudence because we have accorded full First Amend-
ment protection to expressions of intensity. See Cohen v. California, 403
U. S. 15, 25–26 (1971) (protecting the use of an obscenity to stress a point).
Equally unavailing is the claim that a contribution warrants less protec-
tion because it “does not communicate the underlying basis for the sup-
port.” Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 21 (quoted ante, at 386). We regularly
hold that speech is protected when the underlying basis for a position is
not given. See, e. g., City of Ladue v. Gilleo, 512 U. S. 43, 46 (1994) (sign
reading “For Peace in the Gulf ”); Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Com-
munity School Dist., 393 U. S. 503, 510–511 (1969) (black armband signify-
ing opposition to Vietnam war). See also Colorado Republican Federal
Campaign Comm. v. Federal Election Comm’n, 518 U. S. 604, 640 (1996)
(Thomas, J., concurring in judgment and dissenting in part) (“Even a pure
message of support, unadorned with reasons, is valuable to the democratic
process”). Cf. Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual
Group of Boston, Inc., 515 U. S. 557, 569 (1995) (opinion of the Court by
Souter, J.) (“[A] narrow, succinctly articulable message is not a condition
of constitutional protection”).
4 Justice Stevens asserts that “[m]oney is property; it is not speech,”
ante, at 398 (concurring opinion), and contends that there is no First
Amendment right “to hire mercenaries” and “to hire gladiators,” ante, at
399. These propositions are directly contradicted by many of our prece-
dents. For example, in Meyer v. Grant, 486 U. S. 414 (1988) (opinion of
the Court by Stevens, J.), this Court confronted a state ban on payments
to petition circulators. The District Court upheld the law, finding that
the ban on monetary payments did not restrain expression and that the

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Thomas, J., dissenting
cused and candidate driven. Citizens recognize that the
best advocate for a candidate (and the policy positions he
supports) tends to be the candidate himself. And candidate
organizations also offer other advantages to citizens wishing
to partake in political expression. Campaign organizations
offer a ready-built, convenient means of communicating for
donors wishing to support and amplify political messages.
Furthermore, the leader of the organization—the candi-
date—has a strong self-interest in efficiently expending
funds in a manner that maximizes the power of the messages
the contributor seeks to disseminate. Individual citizens
understandably realize that they “may add more to political
would-be payors remained free to use their money in other ways. Id., at
418. We disagreed and held that “[t]he refusal to permit appellees to pay
petition circulators restricts political expression” by “limit[ing] the num-
ber of voices who will convey appellees’ message and the hours they can
speak and, therefore, limits the size of the audience they can reach.” Id.,
at 422–423. In short, the Court held that the First Amendment protects
the right to pay others to help get a message out. In other cases, this
Court extended such protection, holding that the First Amendment pro-
hibits laws that do not ban, but instead only regulate, the terms upon
which so-called mercenaries and gladiators are retained. See Riley v.
National Federation of Blind of N. C., Inc., 487 U. S. 781 (1988) (holding
that the First Amendment prohibits state restriction on the amount a
charity may pay a professional fundraiser); Secretary of State of Md. v.
Joseph H. Munson Co., 467 U. S. 947 (1984) (same). Cf. also, e. g., Teachers
v. Hudson, 475 U. S. 292 (1986) (opinion of the Court by Stevens, J.) (hold-
ing that the First Amendment restrains government-compelled exactions
of money); Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Ed., 431 U. S. 209 (1977) (same). In
these cases, the Court did not resort to Justice Stevens’ assertion that
money “is not speech” to dismiss challenges to monetary regulations. In-
stead, the Court properly examined the impact of the regulations on free
expression. See also, e. g., Federal Election Comm’n v. National Con-
servative Political Action Comm., 470 U. S. 480 (1985) (First Amendment
protects political committee’s expenditures of money); Citizens Against
Rent Control/Coalition for Fair Housing v. Berkeley, 454 U. S. 290 (1981)
(First Amendment protects monetary contributions to political commit-
tee); First Nat. Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U. S. 765, 769 (1978) (First
Amendment protects “spend[ing] money to publicize [political] views”).

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discourse by giving rather than spending, if the donee is able
to put the funds to more productive use than can the individ-
ual.” Colorado Republican, 518 U. S., at 636 (Thomas, J.,
concurring in judgment and dissenting in part). See also
Federal Election Comm’n v. Massachusetts Citizens for
Life, Inc., 479 U. S. 238, 261 (1986) (“[I]ndividuals contribute
to a political organization in part because they regard such
a contribution as a more effective means of advocacy than
spending the money under their own personal direction”).5
In the end, Buckley’s claim that contribution limits
“d[o] not in any way infringe the contributor’s freedom to
discuss candidates and issues,” 424 U. S., at 21 (quoted ante,
at 387), ignores the distinct role of candidate organizations
as a means of individual participation in the Nation’s civic
dialogue.6 The result is simply the suppression of political
5 Even if contributions to a candidate were not the most effective means
of speaking—and contribution caps left political speech “significantly un-
impaired,” ante, at 387—an individual’s choice of that mode of expression
would still be protected. “The First Amendment protects [individuals’]
right not only to advocate their cause but also to select what they believe
to be the most effective means for so doing.” Meyer, supra, at 424 (opin-
ion of the Court by Stevens, J.). See also Glickman v. Wileman Broth-
ers & Elliott, Inc., 521 U. S. 457, 488 (1997) (Souter, J., dissenting) (noting
a “First Amendment interest in touting [one’s] wares as he sees fit”).
6 Buckley’s approach to associational freedom is also unsound. In de-
fense of its decision, the Court in Buckley explained that contribution
limits “leave the contributor free to become a member of any political
association and to assist personally in the association’s efforts on behalf of
candidates.” 424 U. S., at 22 (quoted ante, at 387). In essence, the Court
accepted contribution limits because alternative channels of association
remained open. This justification, however, is peculiar because we have
rejected the notion that a law will pass First Amendment muster simply
because it leaves open other opportunities. Spence v. Washington, 418
U. S. 405, 411, n. 4 (1974) (per curiam) (Although a prohibition’s effect
may be “ ‘minuscule and trifling,’ ” a person “ ‘is not to have the exercise
of his liberty of expression in appropriate places abridged on the plea that
it may be exercised in some other place’ ” (quoting Schneider v. State
(Town of Irvington), 308 U. S. 147, 163 (1939))). See also, e. g., Texas v.
Johnson, 491 U. S. 397, 416, n. 11 (1989); Kusper v. Pontikes, 414 U. S. 51,

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418 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
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speech. By depriving donors of their right to speak through
the candidate, contribution limits relegate donors’ points of
view to less effective modes of communication. Addition-
ally, limiting contributions curtails individual participation.
“Even for the affluent, the added costs in money or time of
taking out a newspaper advertisement, handing out leaflets
on the street, or standing in front of one’s house with a
hand-held sign may make the difference between participat-
ing and not participating in some public debate.” City of
Ladue v. Gilleo, 512 U. S. 43, 57 (1994) (opinion of the Court
by Stevens, J.). Buckley completely failed in its attempt
to provide a basis for permitting government to second-
guess the individual choices of citizens partaking in quint-
essentially democratic activities. “The First Amendment
mandates that we presume that speakers, not the govern-
ment, know best both what they want to say and how to say
it.” Riley v. National Federation of Blind of N. C., Inc.,
487 U. S. 781, 790–791 (1988).
B
The Court in Buckley denigrated the speech interests not
only of contributors, but also of candidates. Although the
Court purported to be concerned about the plight of candi-
dates, it nevertheless proceeded to disregard their interests
without justification. The Court did not even attempt to
claim that contribution limits do not suppress the speech of
political candidates. See 424 U. S., at 18 (“[C]ontribution . . .
limitations impose direct quantity restrictions on political
communication and association by . . . candidates”); id., at 33
(“[T]he [contribution] limitations may have a significant ef-
fect on particular challengers or incumbents”). It could not
have, given the reality that donations “mak[e] a significant
contribution to freedom of expression by enhancing the
58 (1973). “For even when pursuing a legitimate interest, a State may
not choose means that unnecessarily restrict constitutionally protected lib-
erty.” Id., at 58–59.

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ability of candidates to present, and the public to receive,
information necessary for the effective operation of the
democratic process.” CBS, Inc. v. FCC, 453 U. S. 367, 396
(1981). See also Citizens Against Rent Control/Coalition
for Fair Housing v. Berkeley, 454 U. S. 290, 299 (1981) (“Plac-
ing limits on contributions which in turn limit expenditures
plainly impairs freedom of expression”). Instead, the Court
abstracted from a candidate’s individual right to speak and
focused exclusively on aggregate campaign funding. See
Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 21 (“There is no indication . . .
that the contribution limitations imposed by the Act would
have any dramatic adverse effect on the funding of cam-
paigns”) (quoted ante, at 395); ante, at 395–396 (There is “no
showing that ‘the limitations prevented candidates and polit-
ical committees from amassing the resources necessary for
effective advocacy’ ” (quoting Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at
21)).
The Court’s flawed and unsupported aggregate approach
ignores both the rights and value of individual candidates.
The First Amendment “is designed and intended to remove
governmental restraints from the arena of public discussion,
putting the decision as to what views shall be voiced largely
into the hands of each of us, in the hope that use of such
freedom will ultimately produce a more capable citizenry and
more perfect polity and in the belief that no other approach
would comport with the premise of individual dignity and
choice upon which our political system rests.” Cohen v. Cal-
ifornia, 403 U. S. 15, 24 (1971) (emphases added). See also
Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U. S. 234, 250 (1957) (plurality
opinion) (“Our form of government is built on the premise
that every citizen shall have the right to engage in political
expression and association”); Richmond v. J. A. Croson Co.,
488 U. S. 469, 493 (1989) (plurality opinion) (“As this Court
has noted in the past, the ‘rights created by the first section
of the Fourteenth Amendment are, by its terms, guaranteed
to the individual. The rights established are personal

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420 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
Thomas, J., dissenting
rights’ ” (quoting Shelley v. Kraemer, 334 U. S. 1, 22 (1948))).
In short, the right to free speech is a right held by each
American, not by Americans en masse. The Court in Buck-
ley provided no basis for suppressing the speech of an indi-
vidual candidate simply because other candidates (or candi-
dates in the aggregate) may succeed in reaching the voting
public. And any such reasoning would fly in the face of the
premise of our political system—liberty vested in individual
hands safeguards the functioning of our democracy. In the
case at hand, the Missouri scheme has a clear and detrimen-
tal effect on a candidate such as respondent Fredman, who
lacks the advantages of incumbency, name recognition, or
substantial personal wealth, but who has managed to attract
the support of a relatively small number of dedicated sup-
porters: It forbids his message from reaching the voters.
And the silencing of a candidate has consequences for politi-
cal debate and competition overall. See Arkansas Ed. Tele-
vision Comm’n v. Forbes, 523 U. S. 666, 692, n. 14 (1998)
(Stevens, J., dissenting) (noting that the suppression of a
minor candidate’s speech may directly affect the outcome of
an election); cf. NAACP v. Button, 371 U. S. 415, 431 (1963)
(“ ‘All political ideas cannot and should not be channeled into
the programs of our two major parties. History has amply
proved the virtue of political activity by minority, dissident
groups . . . ’ ” (quoting Sweezy v. New Hampshire, supra, at
250–251 (plurality opinion))).
In my view, the Constitution leaves it entirely up to citi-
zens and candidates to determine who shall speak, the means
they will use, and the amount of speech sufficient to inform
and persuade. Buckley’s ratification of the government’s at-
tempt to wrest this fundamental right from citizens was
error.
III
Today, the majority blindly adopts Buckley’s flawed rea-
soning without so much as pausing to consider the collapse of

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the speech-by-proxy argument or the reality that Buckley’s
remaining premises fall when deprived of that support.7
After ignoring these shortcomings, the Court proceeds to
apply something less—much less—than strict scrutiny. Just
how much less the majority never says. The Court in Buck-
ley at least purported to employ a test of “ ‘closest scrutiny.’ ”
424 U. S., at 25 (quoting NAACP v. Alabama ex rel. Patter-
son, 357 U. S. 449, 461 (1958)). (The Court’s words were be-
lied by its actions, however, and it never deployed the test
in the fashion that the superlative instructs. See Colorado
Republican, 518 U. S., at 640–641, n. 7 (Thomas, J., concur-
ring in judgment and dissenting in part) (noting that Buck-
ley purported to apply strict scrutiny but failed to do so in
fact).) The Court today abandons even that pretense and
reviews contributions under the sui generis “Buckley’s
standard of scrutiny,” ante, at 387, which fails to obscure the
Court’s ad hoc balancing away of First Amendment rights.
Apart from its endorsement of Buckley’s rejection of the in-
termediate standards of review used to evaluate expressive
conduct and time, place, and manner restrictions, ante, at
386, the Court makes no effort to justify its deviation from
the tests we traditionally employ in free speech cases. See
Denver Area Ed. Telecommunications Consortium, Inc. v.
FCC, 518 U. S. 727, 774 (1996) (Souter, J., concurring) (“Re-
viewing speech regulations under fairly strict categorical
rules keeps the starch in the standards for those moments
7 Implicitly, however, the majority downplays its reliance upon the
speech-by-proxy argument. In fact, the majority reprints nearly all of
Buckley’s analysis of contributors’ speech interests, block quoting almost
an entire paragraph from that decision. See ante, at 386–387 (quoting
Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S., at 20–21). Tellingly, the only complete sen-
tence from that paragraph that the majority fails to quote is the final
sentence—which happens to be the one directly setting forth the speech-
by-proxy rationale. See id., at 21 (“While contributions may result in
political expression if spent by a candidate or an association to present
views to the voters, the transformation of contributions into political de-
bate involves speech by someone other than the contributor”).

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when the daily politics cries loudest for limiting what may
be said”).
Unfortunately, the majority does not stop with a revision
of Buckley’s labels. After hiding behind Buckley’s discred-
ited reasoning and invoking “Buckley’s standard of scru-
tiny,” ante, at 387, the Court proceeds to significantly extend
the holding in that case. The Court’s substantive departure
from Buckley begins with a revision of our compelling-
interest jurisprudence. In Buckley, the Court indicated
that the only interest that could qualify as “compelling” in
this area was the government’s interest in reducing actual
and apparent corruption.8 424 U. S., at 25–26. And the
Court repeatedly used the word “corruption” in the narrow
quid pro quo sense, meaning “[p]erversion or destruction of
integrity in the discharge of public duties by bribery or fa-
vour.” 3 Oxford English Dictionary 974 (2d ed. 1989). See
also Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 512
(1976) (“inducement (as of a political official) by means of
improper considerations (as bribery) to commit a violation of
duty”). When the Court set forth the interest in preventing
actual corruption, it spoke about “large contributions . . .
given to secure a political quid pro quo from current and
potential office holders.” Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S., at 26.
The Court used similar language when it set forth the inter-
est in protecting against the appearance of corruption: “Of
almost equal concern as the danger of actual quid pro quo
arrangements is the impact of the appearance of corruption
stemming from public awareness of the opportunities for
abuse inherent in a regime of large individual financial con-
8 The Court in Buckley explicitly rejected two other proffered rationales
for campaign finance regulation as out of tune with the First Amendment:
equalization of the ability of citizens to affect the outcome of elections and
controlling the costs of campaigns. See 424 U. S., at 48–49 (governmen-
tally imposed equalization measures are “wholly foreign to the First
Amendment”); id., at 57 (mounting costs of elections “provid[e] no basis
for governmental restrictions on the quantity of campaign spending”).

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tributions.” Id., at 27. Later, in discussing limits on inde-
pendent expenditures, the Court yet again referred to the
interest in protecting against the “dangers of actual or ap-
parent quid pro quo arrangements.” Id., at 45. See also
id., at 47 (referring to “the danger that expenditures will be
given as a quid pro quo for improper commitments”); id., at
67 (corruption relates to “post-election special favors that
may be given in return” for contributions). To be sure,
after mentioning quid pro quo transactions, the Court went
on to use more general terms such as “opportunities for
abuse,” id., at 27, “potential for abuse,” id., at 47, “improper
influence,” id., at 27, 29, 45, “attempts . . . to influence,” id.,
at 28, and “buy[ing] influence,” id., at 45. But this general
language acquires concrete meaning only in light of the pre-
ceding specific references to quid pro quo arrangements.
Almost a decade after Buckley, we reiterated that “cor-
ruption” has a narrow meaning with respect to contribution
limitations on individuals:
“Corruption is a subversion of the political process.
Elected officials are influenced to act contrary to their
obligations of office by the prospect of financial gain to
themselves or infusions of money into their campaigns.
The hallmark of corruption is the financial quid pro quo:
dollars for political favors.” National Conservative
Political Action Comm., 470 U. S., at 497.
In that same opinion, we also used “giving official favors” as
a synonym for corruption. Id., at 498.
The majority today, by contrast, separates “corruption”
from its quid pro quo roots and gives it a new, far-reaching
(and speech-suppressing) definition, something like “[t]he
perversion of anything from an original state of purity.” 3
Oxford English Dictionary, supra, at 974. See also Web-
ster’s Third New International Dictionary, supra, at 512 (“a
departure from what is pure or correct”). And the Court
proceeds to define that state of purity, casting aspersions on

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424 NIXON v. SHRINK MISSOURI GOVERNMENT PAC
Thomas, J., dissenting
“politicians too compliant with the wishes of large contribu-
tors.” Ante, at 389. “But precisely what the ‘corruption’
may consist of we are never told with assurance.” National
Conservative Political Action Comm., supra, at 498. Pre-
sumably, the majority does not mean that politicians should
be free of attachments to constituent groups.9 And the ma-
jority does not explicitly rely upon the “harm” that the Court
in Buckley rejected out of hand, namely, that speech could
be regulated to equalize the voices of citizens. Buckley v.
Valeo, supra, at 48–49. Instead, without bothering to offer
any elaboration, much less justification, the majority permits
vague and unenumerated harms to suffice as a compelling
reason for the government to smother political speech.
In refashioning Buckley, the Court then goes on to weaken
the requisite precision in tailoring, while at the same time
representing that its fiat “do[es] not relax Buckley’s stand-
ard.” Ante, at 390, n. 4. The fact is that the majority rati-
9 The Framers, of course, thought such attachments inevitable in a free
society and that faction would infest the political process. As to control-
ling faction, James Madison explained, “There are again two methods of
removing the causes of faction: the one, by destroying the liberty which
is essential to its existence; the other, by giving to every citizen the same
opinions, the same passions, and the same interests.” The Federalist
No. 10, p. 78 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961). Contribution caps are an example of
the first method, which Madison contemptuously dismissed:
“It could never be more truly said than of the first remedy that it was
worse than the disease. Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment
without which it instantly expires. But it could not be a less folly to
abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes fac-
tion than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to
animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency.” Ibid.
The Framers preferred a political system that harnessed such faction for
good, preserving liberty while also ensuring good government. Rather
than adopting the repressive “cure” for faction that the majority today
endorses, the Framers armed individual citizens with a remedy. “If a
faction consists of less than a majority, relief is supplied by the republican
principle, which enables the majority to defeat its sinister views by regu-
lar vote.” Id., at 80.

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Thomas, J., dissenting
fies a law with a much broader sweep than that approved in
Buckley. In Buckley, the Court upheld contribution limits
of $1,000 on individuals and $5,000 on political committees
(in 1976 dollars). 424 U. S., at 28–29, 35–36. Here, by con-
trast, the Court approves much more restrictive contribution
limitations, ranging from $250 to $1,000 (in 1995 dollars) for
both individuals and political committees. Mo. Rev. Stat.
§ 130.032.1 (Supp. 1999). The disparity between Missouri’s
caps and those upheld in Buckley is more pronounced when
one takes into account some measure of inflation. See
Shrink Missouri Government PAC v. Adams, 161 F. 3d 519,
523, and n. 4 (CA8 1998) (noting that, according to the Con-
sumer Price Index, a dollar today purchases about a third of
what it did in 1976 when Buckley was decided). Yet the
Court’s opinion gives not a single indication that the two
laws may differ in their tailoring. See ante, at 395 (Missou-
ri’s caps are “striking [in their] resemblance to the limita-
tions sustained in Buckley”). The Court fails to pay any
regard to the drastically lower level of the limits here, fails
to explain why political committees should be subjected to
the same limits as individuals, and fails to explain why caps
that vary with the size of political districts are tailored to
corruption. I cannot fathom how a $251 contribution could
pose a substantial risk of “secur[ing] a political quid pro
quo.” Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 26. Thus, contribution
caps set at such levels could never be “closely drawn,” ante,
at 387 (quoting Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 25), to preventing
quid pro quo corruption. The majority itself undertakes no
such defense.
The Court also reworks Buckley’s aggregate approach to
the free speech rights of candidates. It begins on the same
track as Buckley, noting that “a showing of one affected indi-
vidual does not point up a system of suppressed political
advocacy that would be unconstitutional under Buckley.”
Ante, at 396. See also, e. g., ibid. (claiming that candidates
“ ‘are still able to amass impressive campaign war chests’ ”

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Thomas, J., dissenting
(quoting Shrink Missouri Government PAC v. Adams, 5
F. Supp. 2d 734, 741 (ED Mo. 1998))). But the Court quickly
deviates from Buckley, persuading itself that Missouri’s lim-
its do not suppress political speech because, prior to the en-
actment of contribution limits, “97.62 percent of all contribu-
tors to candidates for state auditor made contributions of
$2,000 or less.” Ante, at 396. But this statistical anecdote
offers the Court no refuge and the citizenry no comfort. As
an initial matter, the statistic provides no assurance that
Missouri’s law has not reduced the resources supporting po-
litical speech, since the largest contributors provide a dispro-
portionate amount of funds. The majority conspicuously of-
fers no data revealing the percentage of funds provided by
large contributors. (At least the Court in Buckley relied on
the percentage of funds raised by contributions in excess of
the limits. 424 U. S., at 21–22, n. 23, 26, n. 27.) But what-
ever the data would reveal, the Court’s position would re-
main indefensible. If the majority’s assumption is incor-
rect—i. e., if Missouri’s contribution limits actually do
significantly reduce campaign speech—then the majority’s
calm assurance that political speech remains unaffected col-
lapses. If the majority’s assumption is correct—i. e., if large
contributions provide very little assistance to a candidate
seeking to get out his message (and thus will not be missed
when capped)—then the majority’s reasoning still falters.
For if large contributions offer as little help to a candidate
as the Court maintains, then the Court fails to explain why
a candidate would engage in “corruption” for such a meager
benefit. The majority’s statistical claim directly undercuts
its constitutional defense that large contributions pose a sub-
stantial risk of corruption.10
10 The majority’s statistical analysis also overlooks the quantitative data
in the record that directly undercut its position that Missouri’s law does
not create “a system of suppressed political advocacy.” Ante, at 396.
For example, the Court does not bother to note that following the imposi-
tion of contribution limits, total combined spending during primary and

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Thomas, J., dissenting
Given the majority’s ill-advised and illiberal aggregate
rights approach, it is unsurprising that the Court’s pro forma
hunt for suppressed speech proves futile. See ante, at 395–
397. Such will always be the case, for courts have no yard-
stick by which to judge the proper amount and effectiveness
of campaign speech. See, e. g., Smith, Faulty Assumptions
and Undemocratic Consequences of Campaign Finance Re-
form, 105 Yale L. J. 1049, 1061 (1996). I, however, would
not fret about such matters. The First Amendment vests
choices about the proper amount and effectiveness of political
advocacy not in the government—whether in the legislatures
or the courts—but in the people.
IV
In light of the importance of political speech to republican
government, Missouri’s substantial restriction of speech war-
rants strict scrutiny, which requires that contribution limits
be narrowly tailored to a compelling governmental interest.
See Buckley v. American Constitutional Law Foundation,
Inc., 525 U. S. 182, 207 (1999) (Thomas, J., concurring in
judgment); Colorado Republican, 518 U. S., at 640–641
(Thomas, J., concurring in judgment and dissenting in part).
general elections for five statewide offices was cut by over half, falling
from $21,599,000 to $9,337,000. See App. 24–28. Significantly, total
primary election expenditures in each of the races decreased. Ibid. In
fact, after contribution limits were imposed, overall spending in statewide
primary elections plummeted 89 percent, falling from $14,249,000 to
$1,625,000. Ibid. Most importantly, the majority does not bother to
mention that before spending caps were enacted each of the 10 statewide
primary elections was contested, with two to four candidates vying for
every nomination in 1992. After caps were enacted, however, only 1 of
the 10 primary elections was contested. Overall, the total number of can-
didates participating in statewide primaries fell from 32 to 11. See ibid.
Even if these data do not conclusively show that Missouri’s contribution
limits diminish political speech (although it is undeniable that the data
strongly suggest such a result), they at least cast great doubt on the ma-
jority’s assumption that the picture is rosy.

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Missouri does assert that its contribution caps are aimed
at preventing actual and apparent corruption. Brief for
Petitioners 26–28. As we have noted, “preventing corrup-
tion or the appearance of corruption are the only legitimate
and compelling government interests thus far identified for
restricting campaign finances.” National Conservative Po-
litical Action Comm., 470 U. S., at 496–497. But the State’s
contribution limits are not narrowly tailored to that harm.
The limits directly suppress the political speech of both con-
tributors and candidates, and only clumsily further the gov-
ernmental interests that they allegedly serve. They are
crudely tailored because they are massively overinclusive,
prohibiting all donors who wish to contribute in excess of
the cap from doing so and restricting donations without re-
gard to whether the donors pose any real corruption risk.
See Colorado Republican, supra, at 642 (Thomas, J., concur-
ring in judgment and dissenting in part) (“ ‘Where First
Amendment rights are involved, a blunderbuss approach
which prohibits mostly innocent speech cannot be held a
means narrowly and precisely directed to the governmental
interest in the small minority of contributions that are not
innocent’ ” (quoting Brief for Appellants in Buckley v. Valeo,
O. T. 1975, Nos. 75–436 and 75–437, pp. 117–118)). See also
Martin v. City of Struthers, 319 U. S. 141, 145 (1943) (Though
a method of speaking may be “a blind for criminal activities,
[it] may also be useful [to] members of society engaged in the
dissemination of ideas in accordance with the best tradi-
tion of free discussion”). Moreover, the government has
less restrictive means of addressing its interest in curtailing
corruption. Bribery laws bar precisely the quid pro quo
arrangements that are targeted here. And disclosure laws
“ ‘deter actual corruption and avoid the appearance of cor-
ruption by exposing large contributions and expenditures
to the light of publicity.’ ” American Constitutional Law
Foundation, supra, at 202 (quoting Buckley v. Valeo, 424
U. S., at 67). In fact, Missouri has enacted strict disclo-

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Thomas, J., dissenting
sure laws. See Mo. Rev. Stat. §§ 130.041, 130.046, 130.057
(Supp. 1999).
In the end, contribution limitations find support only in
the proposition that other means will not be as effective at
rooting out corruption. But when it comes to a significant
infringement on our fundamental liberties, that some unde-
sirable conduct may not be deterred is an insufficient justifi-
cation to sweep in vast amounts of protected political speech.
Our First Amendment precedents have repeatedly stressed
this point. For example, in Martin v. City of Struthers,
supra, we struck down an ordinance prohibiting door-to-door
distribution of handbills. Although we recognized that
“burglars frequently pose as canvassers,” id., at 144, we also
noted that door-to-door distribution was “useful [to] mem-
bers of society engaged in the dissemination of ideas in ac-
cordance with the best tradition of free discussion,” id., at
145. We then struck down the ordinance, observing that the
“dangers of distribution can so easily be controlled by tradi-
tional legal methods.” Id., at 147. Similarly, in Riley v.
National Federation of Blind of N. C., Inc., 487 U. S. 781
(1988), we struck down a law regulating the fees charged by
professional fundraisers. In response to the assertion that
citizens would be defrauded in the absence of such a law,
we explained that the State had an antifraud law which “we
presume[d] that law enforcement officers [we]re ready and
able to enforce,” id., at 795, and that the State could constitu-
tionally require fundraisers to disclose certain financial infor-
mation, ibid. We concluded by acknowledging the obvious
consequences of the narrow tailoring requirement: “If this is
not the most efficient means of preventing fraud, we reaffirm
simply and emphatically that the First Amendment does not
permit the State to sacrifice speech for efficiency.” Ibid.
See also, e. g., Schneider v. State (Town of Irvington), 308
U. S. 147, 162 (1939) (“There are obvious methods of prevent-
ing littering. Amongst these is the punishment of those
who actually throw papers on the streets”).

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Thomas, J., dissenting
The same principles apply here, and dictate a result con-
trary to the one the majority reaches. States are free to
enact laws that directly punish those engaged in corruption
and require the disclosure of large contributions, but they
are not free to enact generalized laws that suppress a tre-
mendous amount of protected speech along with the tar-
geted corruption.
V
Because the Court unjustifiably discounts the First
Amendment interests of citizens and candidates, and conse-
quently fails to strictly scrutinize the inhibition of political
speech and competition, I respectfully dissent.