Cite as: 517 U. S. 186 (1996)
Scalia, J., dissenting
Justice Scalia, with whom Justice Thomas joins, dissenting.
"Any interference with the freedom of a party is simultaneously an interference with the freedom of its adherents." Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U. S. 234, 250 (1957). For that reason, we have always treated government assertion of control over the internal affairs of political parties—which, after all, are simply groups of like-minded individual voters—as a matter of the utmost constitutional consequence. See, e. g., Democratic Party of United States v. Wisconsin ex rel. La Follette, 450 U. S. 107, 121-122 (1981); Cousins v. Wigoda, 419 U. S. 477, 487-488 (1975); O'Brien v. Brown, 409 U. S. 1, 4-5 (1972) (per curiam). What is at issue in this case, therefore, is not merely interpretation of § 5 of the Voting Rights Act, 42 U. S. C. § 1973c, but, inextricably bound up with that interpretation, the First Amendment freedom of political association.
There are several respects in which both Justice Stevens' opinion and Justice Breyer's opinion concurring in the judgment constitute remarkable departures from the settled course of our First Amendment jurisprudence. The most obvious, perhaps, is their refusal to consider the present application of § 5 unconstitutional on the basis of "hypothetical cases unrelated to the facts of this case [that] might implicate First Amendment concerns." Stevens, J., ante, at 228.1 Instead, they "leave consideration of hypothetical concerns for another day," ante, at 229, and reserve such "difficult" questions "for a case that squarely presents them," Breyer, J., ante, at 239. That is a luxury our precedents do not allow. It has been a constant of our free-speech jurisprudence that claimants whose First Amendment rights are affected may challenge a statute, not merely on the ground that its specific application to them is unconstitutional, but
1 For brevity's sake, I cite each of today's opinions by the name of its author.
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