JURIST - Paper Chase: Supreme Court rejects challenge of Montana political contribution limits

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court [official website] on Tuesday rejected [order, PDF] a challenge to limits on the political contributions that donors can make to candidates running for Montana state offices. Montana's campaign finance law [MCA § 13-37-216] limits the individual contributions to gubernatorial and lieutenant governor candidates to $500 and contributions to candidates for other statewide offices to $250. Earlier this month, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website] temporarily stayed an injunction [JURIST reports] that blocked Montana's campaign finance law. The Supreme Court's order leaves the Ninth Circuit's decision intact. After the challengers—including state Republican committees, donors and candidates—appealed to the Supreme Court, the justices did not ask for a response [SCOTUSblog report] from the state of Montana before ruling on the matter.

In June the Supreme Court struck down [JURIST report] Montana's century-old campaign finance law known as the 1912 Corrupt Practices Act [PPL backgrounder] as invalid under the Supreme Court's 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission [JURIST report]. The Supreme Court's decision overturned a ruling [JURIST report] by the Montana Supreme Court [official website] that upheld the Corrupt Practices Act.