WHAT is the relevance of the symbiotic relationship between the finance industry and the House Financial Services Committee and the current campaign finance case before the Supreme Court, McCutcheon v Federal Election Commission?

First and foremost, the McCutcheon case revolves around the issue of “corruption and the appearance of corruption.”

Shaun McCutcheon, the chief executive officer of Coalmont Electrical Development, is contesting federal laws that restrict the total or “aggregate” amount an individual can donate to federal candidates and political parties, on the grounds that this restriction unconstitutionally limits his free speech rights. (There are at present no aggregate limits on the total amount that PACS and political party committees can contribute to candidates for federal office; McCutcheon does not engage this issue.)

Ronald Collins and David Skover, two law professors who contribute commentary to ScotusBlog, a Web site devoted to Supreme Court cases, summarize McCutcheon’s position: “During the 2011-2012 federal election cycle,” they write, “McCutcheon contributed to sixteen federal candidates and sought to contribute to twelve others. But for existing law, Mr. McCutcheon would have given $25,000 to each of three political committees established by the Republican Party. The R.N.C. wished to receive additional contributions from individuals like McCutcheon. To do any of this, however, would have contravened existing aggregate contribution limits. ‘I just want to donate to more candidates,’ said McCutcheon, adding rhetorically: ‘Why am I not free to spend money however I want?’ ”

McCutcheon is explicitly not challenging limits on individual campaign donations to federal candidates (set at $2,600), to political parties ($32,400), to state parties ($10,000) or to PACs ($5,000). Instead, McCutcheon’s brief argues that it is unconstitutional to place a $123,200 ceiling on an individual’s total contribution every two years, including a maximum of $48,600 to candidates and $74,600 to all PACs and parties: “Aggregate limits,” it argues, “operate to prevent an individual from associating with, expressing support for, and assisting ‘too many’ candidates, political party committees, or PACs in a single election.”

McCutcheon specifically addresses the issue of corruption this way: “By its very nature, a contribution to a candidate, political party committee, or PAC that is within the legal base limit — that is, a contribution below the threshold at which Congress determined that a cognizable risk of corruption arises — does not raise the specter of corruption. The fact that an individual might choose to make many such innocuous contributions does not render any of them any more troubling or likely to corrupt its recipient.”

Donald B. Verrilli, Jr., the solicitor general, who is arguing the government’s case in support of the restrictions, contended before the court that corruption and the appearance of corruption are, in fact, exactly what is at stake: “Aggregate limits,” he suggested, “combat corruption both by blocking circumvention of individual contribution limits and, equally fundamentally, by serving as a bulwark against a campaign finance system dominated by massive individual contributions in which the dangers of quid pro quo corruption would be obvious and inherent and the corrosive appearance of corruption would be overwhelming.”