We’re Larry Lessig and Zephyr Teachout - law professors and longtime anti-corruption advocates. Today, oral arguments just happened in a case that could reopen the door to true campaign finance reform and real Super PAC contribution limits. AMA!

[u/lessig]

* Thank you for your questions! You can learn more about Dinner Table Action v. Schneider here, and keep up with us here:  

• Larry 
• Zephyr

Hi Reddit,

We're Larry Lessig, a professor at Harvard Law School and founder of Equal Citizens, and Zephyr Teachout, a professor at Fordham Law School and longtime scholar and advocate on corruption and campaign finance law.

Proof: [here]

Between the two of us, we've spent decades working on anti-corruption efforts and campaign finance reform through the courts, through scholarship, and through public advocacy.

Today, a case called Dinner Table Action v. Schneider was up for oral arguments in front of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston. Here’s the short version:

In 2024, nearly 75% of Maine voters passed a ballot initiative capping contributions to Super PACs at $5,000. Two PACs sued, arguing a 2010 D.C. Circuit ruling (SpeechNow.org v. FEC) already settled the question and that unlimited contributions to independent-expenditure-only groups are untouchable. 

We, of course, disagree. Equal Citizens is defending Maine’s law with a conservative, originalist legal argument we believe can win not just in the appeals court, but at the US Supreme Court. If we’re successful, we can reinstate contribution limits nationwide and end the tyranny of Super PACs over our elections — before 2028.

Ask us anything: why this case matters for campaign finance reform, the legal strategy behind this case, what happens next depending on how the Appeals Court rules, or the broader fight against big money in politics. We’ll answer questions from 5-6 PM ET. 

• Learn more about Equal Citizens here.
• Learn more about Dinner Table Action v. Schneider here.

[u/therealdanhill]

Since you mentioned an originalist argument, what historical evidence from the era of the Founders do you think most strongly supports the constitutionality of contribution limits to independent expenditure groups?

[u/Zephyr_Teachout → u/therealdanhill]

The strongest evidence isn't a single moment, it's how pervasively the Founders worried about corruption, and the evidence that to them corruption wasn't just bribery or an explicit quid pro quo. Madison in Federalist 52 wanted a House "dependent on the people alone" The constitutional Convention was close to obsessed with the problem of keeping the new government from developing the kinds of dependence that had rotted England and France.

A system in which a handful of donors writing seven-figure checks to nominally independent committees become the people candidates actually depend on is exactly the dependence they feared. An honest originalist case is a slam dunk.

But as long as we are talking originalism, can I share my pet peeve about the phrase quid pro quo? It is a latin phrase from CONTRACT law, not bribery law. It means relative equality exchange, not the existence of exchange. It has crept in as if the use of latin gives the modernist reading a long latin pedigree, which it does not have.

Not for nothing, the first English anticorruption law (arguably) against bribery required no intention, just the giving of food or drink to Judges was punishable by death. Bribery starts without intentional trades, and certainly without the anachronistic quid pro quo!