In January 2004, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) and others filed a constitutional challenge to several aspects of Arizona’s public campaign financing system. The district court dismissed the challenge, and plaintiffs appealed.  The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit originally affirmed the lower court, dismissing the entire case as moot on May 10, 2007. Upon plaintiffs’ petition for rehearing, however, the Court of Appeals, sitting en banc, determined that some of the claims were not moot, and remanded the case to the district court to permit further development of these claims. Plaintiffs eventually voluntarily dismissed their case, with similar issues being litigated in McComish v. Bennett.

In Valdes v. United States, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit reviewed the conviction of a police officer under the federal gratuities statute accepting cash from an undercover FBI agent in exchange for searching law enforcement databases for information.  The D.C. Circuit, sitting en banc, reversed the conviction, finding that the police officer’s action did not rise to the level of an “official act” as required by federal law because his use of the database was not part of a pending police matter and not part of his assigned official duties.  It construed the term “official act” to include only those formal, official actions that are connected to a “class of questions or matters whose answer or disposition is determined by the government,” thereby greatly narrowing the scope and effectiveness of the federal prohibition on gratuities.

In 2006, the Christian Civic League challenged the constitutionality of BCRA’s electioneering communications provision as applied to advertisement CCL alleged it wished to broadcast naming a candidate during the period before the election. A three-judge District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed the suit as moot.  In 2007, the Supreme Court vacated the judgment and remanded the case to the district court “for further consideration in light of Federal Election Commission v. Wisconsin Right to Life, Inc.”

The CLC served as co-counsel to the defendant-intervenors.

Illinois’ highest court selects its judges through partisan elections. This case reached that court in 2002 following a $1.05 billion verdict against State Farm Mutual Auto. Ins. Company. While the case was pending, a new judge was elected to the Illinois Supreme Court, who received more than $1 million in direct and indirect campaign contributions from  State Farm and groups affiliated with State Farm.  The judge refused to disqualify himself and then cast the deciding vote in favor of State Farm overturning the verdict.  The petition for certiorari raised the question whether a judge receiving such financial support from a party and its supporters, while that party’s case is pending before him, may cast the deciding vote in that case consistent with the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

In 1999, the Vermont Republican State Committee and other plaintiffs filed a federal district court constitutional challenge to various provisions of Vermont state campaign finance law, including the state’s contribution and expenditure limits. The U.S. Supreme Court granted cert on the questions of whether Vermont’s candidate expenditure limits contribution limits ranging from $200-$400 per candidate violate the First Amendment. The Court struck down both the expenditure limits and the contributions limits. With respect to the expenditure limits, the Court relied on its 1976 decision in Buckley v. Valeo striking down federal expenditure limits on First Amendment grounds. With respect to the contribution limits, the Court noted many differences between Vermont’s limits and the federal and state contribution limits the Court had upheld in earlier decisions against constitutional challenge. The Court found Vermont’s limits to be much lower and more restrictive than the constitutionally permissible contribution limits at the federal level and in other states. Although the Court invalidated Vermont’s contribution limits, the Court’s decision left in force federal limits and limits in other states.

Plaintiff Kean for Congress Committee brought suit against the FEC seeking judicial review of the agency’s dismissal of an administrative complaint. Kean Committee’s administrative complaint concerned political advertisements made against Thomas H. Kean, Jr., a candidate in 2000 for the New Jersey Seventh Congressional District.  The trial court refused to grant the FEC’s motion to dismiss and the FEC’s motion for summary judgement.  The case was eventually settled, and attorneys’ fees were awarded against the FEC.

In February 2005, ballot measure committee Citizens to Save California challenged a California Fair Political Practices Commission regulation establishing a presumption that all contributions to a candidate-controlled ballot measure committee are contributions to a candidate for elective state office subject to candidate contribution limits. The trial court granted plaintiffs’ motion for preliminary injunction. Defendant appealed and in December 2006 the Court of Appeal of the State of California, Third Appellate District, affirmed the trial court’s holding that the regulation conflicted with multiple provisions of the state’s Political Reform Act and thereby exceeded the FPPC’s authority; the court deemed it unnecessary to rule on the constitutional claims in the case.

In August 2000, California Pro-Life Council (CPLC) filed a constitutional challenge to California’s reporting and disclosure requirements applicable to groups advocating for or against state ballot measures. The district court dismissed the CPLC’s claims and upheld the challenged state law provisions, and CPLC appealed the decision. In November 2007, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the lower court in part, holding that “mixed purpose” organizations that only occasionally support or oppose ballot measures do not have to register as political committees and comply with statutory record-keeping and reporting requirements. However, the court found that such organizations could be required to report contributions exceeding $1,000 which were used for ballot measure advocacy.

In October 2002, Reps. Christopher Shays (R-CT) and Marty Meehan (D-MA) filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia against the FEC challenging 19 regulations adopted by the FEC to implement Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA). In September 2004, the District Court struck down 15 of the 19 contested regulations and ordered the FEC to rewrite the rules. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court decision.

Plaintiff, North Carolina Right to Life, Inc., (“NCRL”) brought this action in 1999 challenging the constitutionality of North Carolina’s definition “political committee," trigger for when a communication constituted electoral advocacy requiring disclosure and the contribution limit applicable to independent expenditure political committees.

In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit found the challenged portions of North Carolina's law unconstitutional.

The CLC, together with other organizations, filed as amici curiae in support of North Carolina’s law in the district court and court of appeals.