The United States Supreme Court will again review Arizona’s attempt to level the playing field for political candidates, agreeing to determine the constitutionality of Arizona’s law to distribute campaign subsidies to publicly funded candidates who face big-spending opponents.

In June, the Supreme Court blocked a portion of Arizona’s Clean Elections program, which authorized the state to provide “matching funds” to those candidates who face opponents spending large amounts of their own money or outside groups that target them.  The court combined two cases, Arizona Free Enterprise, et al v. Bennett and McComish v. Bennett, and will hear arguments in the spring of 2011.

Picture of the U.S. Supreme Court by UpstateNYer on Wikipedia.

In their application, the plaintiffs, represented by James Bopp, Jr., the Indiana attorney who helped launch the landmark Citizens United v. FEC litigation, requested an order blocking portions of Maine’s campaign finance law which provides matching for candidates as well as the part of Maine law capping contributions to gubernatorial candidates at $750. By the time the plaintiff’s motion reached the high court for the second time, it had been denied three times: by Associate Justice Stephen Breyer, Circuit Justice for the First Circuit, by the First Circuit Court of Appeals, and by the Maine District Court where the litigation originated.

The plaintiff’s last resort to enjoin the law prior to the November 2nd election was the emergency writ of injunction to the Supreme Court which was presented to Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy who then referred it to the Supreme Court for consideration. The writ’s denial was not unexpected as the Supreme Court has not granted such a motion for two decades.

Photo of the Supreme Court by UpstateNYer on Wikipedia.