National Republican Senatorial Committee v. Federal Election Comm’n · ¶127

It does not take much imagination to see how that scheme circumvents the contribution limit for a candidate, and raises the risk of both actual and apparent quid pro quo corruption. On a formal level, all base limits are complied with—$7,000 to the candidate, $10,000 each to state party committees, and $44,300 to the national one. Except that in the real world, the candidate can get all the money for his own campaign. So an ostensibly capped contribution of $7,000 becomes . . . a $550,000 contribution (again, $551,300 to be precise) to John Smith. And of course everyone knows this. The candidate recognizes both what the $550,000 contribution will do for him and where it originally came from. The donor understands the main points too. His measly $7,000 was not likely to have bought from the candidate anything of consequence. But $550,000 is a whole different story. And even if John Smith…

slip opinion
Source edition
Passage preview. Read in context for the complete text, notes and references.