Cite as: 540 U. S. 93 (2003)
Opinion of the Court
press advocacy and so-called issue advocacy is not constitutionally compelled. In that light, we must examine the degree to which BCRA burdens First Amendment expression and evaluate whether a compelling governmental interest justifies that burden. Id., at 657. The latter question— whether the state interest is compelling—is easily answered by our prior decisions regarding campaign finance regulation, which "represent respect for the 'legislative judgment that the special characteristics of the corporate structure require particularly careful regulation.' " Beaumont, supra, at 155 (quoting National Right to Work, 459 U. S., at 209- 210). We have repeatedly sustained legislation aimed at "the corrosive and distorting effects of immense aggregations of wealth that are accumulated with the help of the corporate form and that have little or no correlation to the public's support for the corporation's political ideas." Austin, supra, at 660; see Beaumont, supra, at 154-155; National Right to Work, supra, at 209-210. Moreover, recent cases have recognized that certain restrictions on corporate electoral involvement permissibly hedge against " 'circumvention of [valid] contribution limits.' " Beaumont, supra, at 155 (quoting Colorado II, 533 U. S., at 456, and n. 18.)
In light of our precedents, plaintiffs do not contest that the Government has a compelling interest in regulating advertisements that expressly advocate the election or defeat of a candidate for federal office. Nor do they contend that the speech involved in so-called issue advocacy is any more core political speech than are words of express advocacy. After all, "the constitutional guarantee has its fullest and most urgent application precisely to the conduct of campaigns for political office," Monitor Patriot Co. v. Roy, 401 U. S. 265, 272 (1971), and "[a]dvocacy of the election or defeat of candidates for federal office is no less entitled to protection under the First Amendment than the discussion of political policy generally or advocacy of the passage or defeat of legislation," Buckley, 424 U. S., at 48. Rather, plaintiffs argue that
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