Must-read Richard Briffault at Columbia Law Review‘s Sidebar:

The Supreme Court’s insistence that independent spending does not pose dangers of corruption or the appearance of corruption has been doubtful from the start, as candidates are surely aware of and gratified by the support provided by independent groups, much as members of the public may be concerned about how that gratitude could affect official decisionmaking by successful candidates after the election. But there is at least some constitutional claim to recognizing the expressive and associational rights of groups—like the Christian Coalition—that have existence independent of a specific election campaign and policies and goals apart from and in addition to the election of a single, specific candidate. Single-candidate committees established and operated by recent former staff to the candidate or hailed by the candidate as organizations to which financial backers of the candidate should send their funds, however, are not independent in the sense that Buckley sought to protect. Rather, their spending flouts Buckley’s contribution/expenditure distinction.

The explosion of independent spending funded by Super PACs and other organizations in the last two election cycles raises new questions about the effectiveness of contribution limits and, perhaps, about the value of maintaining them.⁶² But if the law is to continue to limit contributions because of the dangers of corruption and the appearance of corruption they pose, and to maintain the integrity of the contribution/expenditure distinction that has been a foundational part of our campaign finance law for nearly four decades, it is essential to redefine coordination to address the emergence of single-candidate Super PACs. The proposal in this Essay is intended as a contribution to that process.