460
REPUBLICAN FEDERAL CAMPAIGN COMM. Opinion of the Court
done independently, and thus less desirably from the point of view of a donor and his favored candidate. If suddenly every dollar of spending could be coordinated with the candidate, the inducement to circumvent would almost certainly intensify. Indeed, if a candidate could be assured that donations through a party could result in funds passed through to him for spending on virtually identical items as his own campaign funds, a candidate enjoying the patronage of affluent contributors would have a strong incentive not merely to direct donors to his party, but to promote circumvention as a step toward reducing the number of donors requiring time-consuming cultivation. If a candidate could arrange for a party committee to foot his bills, to be paid with $20,000 contributions to the party by his supporters, the number of donors necessary to raise $1,000,000 could be reduced from 500 (at $2,000 per cycle) to 46 (at $2,000 to the candidate and $20,000 to the party, without regard to donations outside the election year).23
23 Any such dollar-for-dollar pass-through would presumably be too obvious to escape the special provision on earmarking, 2 U. S. C. § 441a(a)(8), see infra, at 462. But the example illustrates the undeniable inducement to more subtle circumvention.
The same enhanced value of coordinated spending that could be expected to promote greater circumvention of contribution limits for the benefit of the candidate-fundraiser would probably enhance the power of the fundraiser to use circumvention as a tactic to increase personal power and a claim to party leadership. The affluent nominee can already do this to a limited extent, by directing donations to the party and making sure that the party knows who raised the money, and that the needier candidates who receive the benefit of party spending know whom to thank. The candidate can thus become a player beyond his own race, and the donor's influence is multiplied. See generally App. 249 (Hickmott declaration) ("Incumbents who were not raising money for themselves because they were not up for reelection would sometimes raise money for other Senators, or for challengers. They would send $20,000 to the DSCC and ask that this be entered on another candidate's tally. They might do this, for example, if they were planning to run for a leadership position and wanted to obtain the support of the Senators they assisted"). If the effectiveness of party spending could be enhanced by limitless coordination, the ties of straitened candidates to prosperous ones and, vicariously, to
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