Cite as: 540 U. S. 93 (2003)
Opinion of the Court
a federal election. In the absence of this provision, a party might use soft money to pay for the equivalent of a full-time employee engaged in federal electioneering, by the simple expedient of dividing the federal workload among multiple employees. Plaintiffs have suggested no reason for us to strike down this provision. Accordingly, we give "deference to [the] congressional determination of the need for [this] prophylactic rule." National Conservative Political Action Comm., 470 U. S., at 500.
b. Associational Burdens Imposed by the Levin Amendment
Plaintiffs also contend that § 323(b) is unconstitutional because the Levin Amendment unjustifiably burdens association among party committees by forbidding transfers of Levin funds among state parties, transfers of hard money to fund the allocable federal portion of Levin expenditures, and joint fundraising of Levin funds by state parties. We recognize, as we have in the past, the importance of preserving the associational freedom of parties. See, e. g., California Democratic Party v. Jones, 530 U. S. 567 (2000); Eu v. San Francisco County Democratic Central Comm., 489 U. S. 214 (1989). But not every minor restriction on parties' otherwise unrestrained ability to associate is of constitutional dimension. See Colorado II, 533 U. S., at 450, n. 11.
As an initial matter, we note that state and local parties can avoid these associational burdens altogether by forgoing the Levin Amendment option and electing to pay for federal election activities entirely with hard money. But in any event, the restrictions on the use, transfer, and raising of Levin funds are justifiable anticircumvention measures. Without the ban on transfers of Levin funds among state committees, donors could readily circumvent the $10,000 limit on contributions to a committee's Levin account by making multiple $10,000 donations to various committees that could then transfer the donations to the committee of
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