On April 26, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia issued this procedural ruling in Holmes v FEC, 15-5120. The Holmes case is a challenge to the federal campaign finance limits from individual givers. The federal law lets an individual give $2,700 to a federal candidate in primary season, and another $2,700 in the general election. The plaintiffs say that if Congress does not believe a combined contribution of $5,400 to one particular candidate will cause corrpution, there can’t be any logical reason why the individual donor can’t give $5,400 to the candidate during the general election season (assuming he or she has given nothing to the candidate in primary season).

The Appeals Court did not decide the merits of this case, but it did rule that the case is not frivolous, and therefore it must be set before the entire panel of Judges in the D.C. Circuit. Congress wrote the campaign finance laws in 1974 to provide that when someone sues over the constitutionally of the federal campaign finance laws of 1974, the case must be set before all the Circuit Judges, unless it is a frivolous case. So, now the case gets its chance to be argued in front of all fourteen of the Appeals Judges.

This ruling virtually guarantees that another case, Libertarian National Committee v FEC, will also go before all the circuit judges. That is the case over whether the Libertarian Party can accept a $235,575 bequest all at once, or whether it can only get the money piecemeal, by receiving $33,400 per year while most of the money remains in escrow. Attorneys for the FEC have been fighting the party’s attempt to get the case before the Appeals judges.