FEC v. Beaumont
Public Citizen, on behalf of itself and four other groups (Common Cause, Democracy 21, the Center for Responsive Politics, and the Campaign and Media Legal Center) has filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the U.S. Supreme Court supporting the Federal Election Commission’s efforts to overturn a ruling of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit that allows non-profit corporations to make contributions to candidates for federal office. The court of appeals’ ruling would have undermined the effectiveness of campaign contribution limits and will open yet another loophole for special interest money to distort the electoral process.
On June 16, 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the court of appeals and accepted the argument presented in our amicus brief that the prohibition of corporate political contributions is constitutional as applied to nonprofit as well as for-profit corporations.