United States Fourth Circuit

Dismissal of a challenge to the constitutionality of North Carolina's Judicial Campaign Reform Act, which creates a system of voluntary public financing for judicial candidates at the appellate level, is affirmed where the challenged provisions were permissible campaign finance regulations and were consistent with the First Amendment, as interpreted by the Supreme Court in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1 (1976), and McConnell v. FEC, 540 U.S. 93 (2003).

Appellate Information

• Decided 05/01/2008
• Published 05/01/2008

Judges

• Before MICHAEL and TRAXLER, Circuit Judges, and JAMES P. JONES, Chief United States District Judge for the Western District of Virginia, sitting by designation.

Court

• United States Fourth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• ARGUED:  James Bopp, Jr., Bopp, Coleson & Bostrom, Terre Haute, Indiana, for Appellants.  Alexander McClure Peters, Special Deputy Attorney General, North Carolina Department of Justice, Raleigh, North Carolina;  Deborah Goldberg, Brennan Center for Justice, New York, New York, for Appellees.   ON BRIEF:  Anita Y. Woudenberg, Josiah Neeley, Bopp, Coleson & Bostrom, Terre Haute, Indiana, for Appellants.  Roy Cooper, North Carolina Attorney General, Susan K. Nichols, Special Deputy Attorney General, North Carolina Department of Justice, Raleigh, North Carolina;  Suzanne Novak, Brennan Center for Justice, New York, New York;  James G. Exum, Jr., Manning A. Connors, Smith Moore, L.L.P., Greensboro, North Carolina, for Appellees.  Erwin Chemerinsky, Duke University School of Law, Durham, North Carolina;  Anita S. Earls, Durham, North Carolina, for Democracy North Carolina, Amicus Supporting Appellees. J. Gerald Hebert, Paul S. Ryan, Tara Malloy, The Campaign Legal Center, Inc., Washington, D.C., for American Judges Association, Campaign Legal Center, Incorporated, Center for Civic Policy, Demos:  A Network for Ideas and Action, Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, League of Women Voters of the United States, League of Women Voters of North Carolina, Progressive Maryland, Public Citizen, Incorporated, Reform Institute, Amici Supporting Appellees.  Bryce L. Friedman, James G. Gamble, Elaine M. Divelbliss, Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett, L.L.P., New York, New York, for S. Gerald Arnold, G.K. Butterfield, J. Phil Carlton, Henry E. Frye, K. Edward Greene, Harry C. Martin, Francis I. Parker, Willis P. Whichard, Amici Supporting Appellees.