Cite as: 518 U. S. 604 (1996)
Opinion of Thomas, J.
between that facilitates the dissemination of the spender's message—for instance, an advertising agency or a television station. See Powe, supra, at 258-259. To call a contribution "speech by proxy" thus does little to differentiate it from an expenditure. See Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 243-244, and n. 7 (Burger, C. J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). 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.
Moreover, we have recently recognized that where the "proxy" speech is endorsed by those who give, that speech is a fully protected exercise of the donors' associational rights. In Federal Election Comm'n v. NCPAC, we explained:
"[T]he 'proxy speech' approach is not useful . . . [where] the contributors obviously like the message they are hearing from [the] organizatio[n] and want to add their voices to that message; otherwise they would not part with their money. To say that their collective action in pooling their resources to amplify their voices is not entitled to full First Amendment protection would subordinate the voices of those of modest means as opposed to those sufficiently wealthy to be able to buy expensive media ads with their own resources." 470 U. S., at 495.
The other justification in Buckley for the proposition that contribution caps only marginally restrict speech—that is, that a contribution signals only general support for the candidate but indicates nothing about the reasons for that support—is similarly unsatisfying. Assuming the assertion is descriptively accurate (which is certainly questionable), it still cannot mean that giving is less important than spending in terms of the First Amendment. A campaign poster that reads simply "We support candidate Smith" does not seem to me any less deserving of constitutional protection than one that reads "We support candidate Smith because we like
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