440
REPUBLICAN FEDERAL CAMPAIGN COMM. Opinion of the Court
other than parties, the congressional campaign expenditure limitations on parties themselves are facially unconstitutional, and so are incapable of reaching party spending even when coordinated with a candidate. Id., at 623-626.4 We
remanded that facial challenge, which had not been fully briefed or considered below. Ibid. On remand the District Court held for the Party, 41 F. Supp. 2d 1197 (1999), and a divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed, 213 F. 3d 1221 (2000).5 We granted certiorari to resolve the question left open by Colorado I, see 531 U. S. 923 (2000), and we now reverse.
II
Spending for political ends and contributing to political candidates both fall within the First Amendment's protection of speech and political association. Buckley, 424 U. S., at 14-23. But ever since we first reviewed the 1971 Act, we have understood that limits on political expenditures deserve closer scrutiny than restrictions on political contributions. Ibid.; see also, e. g., Shrink Missouri, 528 U. S., at 386-388; Colorado I, supra, at 610, 614-615; Massachusetts Citizens for Life, supra, at 259-260. Restraints on expenditures generally curb more expressive and associational activity than limits on contributions do. Shrink Missouri, supra, at 386-388; Colorado I, supra, at 615; Buckley, supra, at 19-23. A further reason for the distinction is that limits on contribu-4 The limits applicable to Presidential campaigns were not at issue in Colorado I, 518 U. S. 604, 610-611 (1996), and are not at issue here, Brief for Respondent 49, n. 30.
5 Along with its constitutional claim, the Party argued to the District Court that the Party Expenditure Provision's application to independent expenditures was not severable from the other possible applications of the provision, a nonconstitutional basis for resolving the case that the Colorado I principal opinion suggested should be explored on remand. Colorado I, supra, at 625-626. The District Court rejected the nonseverability argument, 41 F. Supp. 2d, at 1207, and the Party did not renew it on appeal, 213 F. 3d, at 1225, n. 3.
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