Cite as: 525 U. S. 182 (1999)
Opinion of the Court
First Amendment protection for such interaction, we agreed, is "at its zenith." Id., at 425 (internal quotation marks omitted). We have also recognized, however, that "there must be a substantial regulation of elections if they are to be fair and honest and if some sort of order, rather than chaos, is to accompany the democratic processes." Storer v. Brown, 415 U. S. 724, 730 (1974); see Timmons v. Twin Cities Area New Party, 520 U. S. 351, 358 (1997); Anderson v. Celebrezze, 460 U. S. 780, 788 (1983). Taking careful account of these guides, the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit upheld some of the State's regulations, but found the three controls at issue excessively restrictive of political speech, and therefore declared them invalid. American Constitutional Law Foundation, Inc. v. Meyer, 120 F. 3d 1092 (1997). We granted certiorari, 522 U. S. 1107 (1998), and now affirm that judgment.
I
The complaint in this action was filed in 1993 in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado pursuant to 42 U. S. C. § 1983; it challenged six of Colorado's many controls on the initiative-petition process. Plaintiffs, now respondents, included American Constitutional Law Foundation, Inc., a nonprofit, public interest organization that supports direct democracy, and several individual participants in Colorado's initiative process. In this opinion we refer to plaintiffs-respondents, collectively, as ACLF.1
1 Individual plaintiffs included: David Aitken, who, as chairman of the Colorado Libertarian Party, had organized the circulation of several initiative petitions; Jon Baraga, statewide petition coordinator for the Colorado Hemp Initiative; Craig Eley and Jack Hawkins, circulators of petitions for the Safe Workplace Initiative and Worker's Choice of Care Initiative; Lonnie Haynes, an initiative-supporting member of ACLF; Alden Kautz, a circulator of numerous initiative petitions; Bill Orr, executive director of ACLF and a qualified but unregistered voter, who regularly participated in the petition process and wanted to circulate petitions; and William David Orr, a minor who wanted to circulate petitions. See American Constitutional Law Foundation, Inc. v. Meyer, 120 F. 3d 1092, 1096-1097 (CA10 1997); Brief for Respondents David Aitken et al. 2, 3, 5, 6.
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