I have written this commentary for The New Republic.  It begins:

Campaign finance laws have now gone 0 for 5 in the Roberts Court. Monday’s Supreme Court decision striking down the matching funds portion of Arizona’s voluntary public financing law—which provided extra public financing for candidates facing free-spending opponents or major outside spending—was no surprise. Indeed, I predicted laws like Arizona’s were doomed back in 2008, on the day the Court struck down a portion of the McCain-Feingold law which raised contribution limits for candidates facing millionaire opponents. The Roberts Court saw both laws as impermissibly trying to level the electoral playing field. Since 2005, the Court has also struck down Vermont’s campaign contribution limits as too low, narrowly interpreted the McCain-Feingold rules governing corporate campaign spending, and then dealt a death blow to those limits in its most controversial decision to date, Citizens United.

Yet today’s decision brings three pieces of unexpected good news to those of us who believe that reasonable campaign finance regulation is not only constitutional, but essential to prevent corruption and ensure fairness in our democracy.