From an Institute for Free Speech symposium on the 50th anniversary of Buckley, which I'll be cross-posting over the next couple of weeks; this is by Lee E. Goodman, a partner at the Dhillon Law Group and a former Chairman of the Federal Election Commission:
I have been citing Buckley v. Valeo (1976) since I started practicing First Amendment law in 1990. Buckley has stood as the cornerstone of First Amendment jurisprudence in the field of campaign finance since 1976, so fundamental that every lawyer was expected to learn it and invoke it like a secular Bible.
No Supreme Court decision has been more significant in shaping the logic that constrains the government's efforts to restrict election campaign-related speech. Numerous Court decisions over the next five decades have built upon the principles established in Buckley, and it continues to guide First Amendment law to this day.
From the beginning, the decision was a thorn in the side of those who sought to restrict campaign speech in the name of "good government" and equitable objectives. Indeed, over the ensuing fifty years, there have been spirited efforts to reinterpret it, reverse it, and even to evade it by altering the First Amendment itself. Such advocates came close once, and only once, in McConnell v. FEC (2003), but have otherwise failed to displace Buckley's logic.
Free speech advocates have relied upon the speech protections established in Buckley and, in doing so, have successfully extended its logic to a broader realm of speech and speakers. The core principles set forth by the per curiam Court in Buckey have endured as the foundation for free speech rights and inspired a number of court decisions expanding free speech in election campaigns.
- Money is not speech, but a necessary tool of expression.
