Ninth Circuit Upholds Montana's Campaign Disclosure Requirements

Steven D. Schwinn, John Marshall Law School

The Ninth Circuit yesterday upheld Montana's political committee reporting and disclosure requirements against First Amendment challenges by a group whose major purpose was not political advocacy. The ruling keeps these requirements on the books.

The case arose when the group Montanans for Community Development refrained from sending a pro-job-growth mailer that mentioned certain candidates in upcoming state elections, because it would have to comply with state political committee reporting and disclosure requirements. MCD sued, arguing that the requirements were unconstitutionally vague, that they were overbroad, and that they were unconstitutional as applied to MCD (as a group whose major purpose wasn't political advocacy).

The court, in a brief and unpublished opinion, rejected these claims. The court said that Montana law put a "person of ordinary intelligence [on] fair notice of what is prohibited" (and thus wasn't vague); that the requirements were substantially related to sufficiently important government interests of informing the electorate, deterring actual corruption and avoiding the appearance of corruption, and gathering data to enforce more substantive electioneering restrictions (and thus wasn't overbroad); and that "[p]olitical committee reporting and disclosure laws can extend beyond groups whose major purpose is political advocacy" (and thus survived MCD's as-applied challenge).