High Court Deals Blow To Campaign Finance Law

Davis, a Democrat who spent millions of dollars on two unsuccessful congressional races and says he is ready to spend $3 million on another, argued that the provision violates his First and Fifth amendment rights and that it protects incumbents by discouraging wealthy challengers.

Davis's was the latest constitutional challenge to the law. Justices upheld key elements of the act in 2003, but last year the court, now led by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., loosened a critical part of the law regarding corporate and union financing of advertising.

Davis and Washington lawyer Stanley Brand say the provision discriminates against candidates who prefer to fund their own campaigns to "convey a message of independence from lobbyists, large donors and other political 'insiders.' " The amendment "infringes on the core political speech of self-financed candidates and violates their right to equal protection of the law," Davis's brief maintains.

A panel of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia disagreed and granted summary judgment in favor of the Federal Election Commission.

That court held that Davis's challenge "fails at the outset" because the amendment "places no restriction on a candidate's ability to spend unlimited amounts of his personal wealth to communicate his message to voters, nor does it reduce the amount of money he is able to raise from contributors."

Solicitor General Paul D. Clement, representing the FEC and Congress, said in his brief to the Supreme Court that the provision is a "modest and constitutionally appropriate attempt to counteract the perception that a candidate who is wealthy enough can buy a seat in Congress."

Clement said the law was carefully tailored to comply with the court's 1976 landmark campaign finance ruling in Buckley v. Valeo. That decision upheld limits on campaign contributions but said that the amount of personal money that candidates spend on their campaigns cannot be restricted.