Buckley v. American Constitutional Law Foundation, Inc., 525 U.S. 182, 45 (1999)

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226

BUCKLEY v. AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONAL LAW FOUNDATION, INC.

Rehnquist, C. J., dissenting

director of the American Constitutional Law Foundation, Inc., while examining a witness, explained to the trial court that "volunteer organizations, they're self-policing and there's not much likelihood of fraud. . . . Paid circulators are perhaps different." Id., at 208-209.

Because the legitimate interests asserted by Colorado are advanced by the disclosure provision and outweigh the incidental and indirect burden that disclosure places on political speech, I would uphold the provision as a reasonable regulation of the electoral process. Colorado's interests are more than legitimate, however. We have previously held that they are substantial. See Buckley v. Valeo, supra, at 67, 68. Therefore, even if I thought more exacting scrutiny were required, I would uphold the disclosure requirements.

Because I feel the Court's decision invalidates permissible regulations that are vitally important to the integrity of the political process, and because the decision threatens the enforceability of other important and permissible regulations, I concur in the judgment only in part and dissent in part.

Chief Justice Rehnquist, dissenting.

The Court today invalidates a number of state laws designed to prevent fraud in the circulation of candidate petitions and to ensure that local issues of state law are decided by local voters, rather than by out-of-state interests. Because I believe that Colorado can constitutionally require that those who circulate initiative petitions to registered voters actually be registered voters themselves, and because I believe that the Court's contrary holding has wide-reaching implication for state regulation of elections generally, I dissent.

I

Ballot initiatives of the sort involved in this case were a central part of the Progressive movement's agenda for reform at the turn of the 20th century, and were advanced as a means of limiting the control of wealthy special inter-

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