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Louisiana imposes an aggregate limit of $100,000 on a person’s contributions to a political committee in Louisiana during a four-year election cycle. An independent expenditure-only committee (i.e., a Super PAC) supporting gubernatorial candidate David Vitter sued, arguing that the cap is unconstitutional as applied to super PACs. A federal judge has now agreed.

“[I]ndependent expenditure committees are sacrosanct under the First Amendment.”

The Louisiana judge sided with the unanimous rulings of seven federal courts of appeals that have struck down limits on contributions to Super PACs. Based on these rulings, and the Supreme Court’s landmark Citizens United case, the judge observed that as a matter of law “independent expenditures present not even a marginal risk of corruption,” a principle that holds even if the Super PAC is formed to support a single candidate.Continue Reading Another One Bites the Dust

Independent expenditure committees (“Super PACs”) have become commonplace at the federal level and in a number of states as well. The legal reasoning behind Super PACs, as explained in the Speechnow case (and several other federal and state cases), is that since the Supreme Court has recognized the right of individuals and corporations to spend …