479 U.S. 208 (1986)
In 1955 Connecticut adopted its present primary election system under which major parties select candidates for federal and statewide offices through statewide conventions of party delegates and district conventions for state legislative seats, with party-endorsed candidates required to receive more than 20 percent of the convention vote and any candidate receiving 20 percent permitted to challenge in a primary.1 The costs of primary elections are paid from public funds, and candidates selected by the major parties receive automatic ballot access in the general election.2 Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-431 has required since that time that voters in any party primary be registered members of that party.3
In 1976 a three-judge District Court upheld § 9-431 against a challenge by an independent voter seeking to participate in the Republican primary; at that time the Republican Party of Connecticut opposed the effort.4 By 1983 the Party had changed its position, citing the demographic importance of independent voters in the state.5 In September 1983 the Party's Central Committee recommended a state convention to consider altering party rules, and in January 1984 the convention adopted Rule 3 permitting any elector enrolled as a Republican or any elector not enrolled in any party to vote in Republican primaries for United States Senator, United States Representative, Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Secretary of the State, Attorney General, Comptroller, and Treasurer.
During the 1984 legislative session Republican leaders proposed amending § 9-431 to allow independents to vote in primaries when permitted by party rules, but the measure was defeated along party lines in the Democratic-controlled legislature.6 The Party and its federal officeholders and state chairman then sued state officials, including Secretary of the State Julia Tashjian, in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief.7 After discovery the parties submitted extensive stipulations of fact, and the District Court granted summary judgment for the Party in December 1984.8
The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed in 1985.9 The Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction in 1986.10 At the time of the rule's adoption Connecticut had 659,268 registered Democrats, 425,695 registered Republicans, and 532,723 registered unaffiliated voters.11
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Justice Stevens joined the Court’s opinion but wrote separately to emphasize that the State’s interest in regulating the primary process must be balanced against the associational rights of the political party.12 In this case, the balance clearly favors the Party’s right to define its own membership for the purpose of selecting its candidates.13
Justice Scalia dissented, joined by the Chief Justice and Justice O’Connor, arguing that the Court’s holding is inconsistent with prior cases upholding closed primaries.14 He contended that the ability of the members of the Republican Party to select their own candidate implicates an associational freedom but that freedom is not unconstitutionally impaired here because the Party is entirely free to put forward the candidate with the highest degree of support among members and independents combined, and the State is under no obligation to let its party primary be used as the means by which the party identifies the relative popularity of its potential candidates among independents.
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Justice Scalia argued that the Court exaggerates the importance of the associational interest at issue.15 He maintained that there is no question here of restricting the Republican Party's ability to recruit and enroll Party members, nor is there any question of restricting the ability of the Party's members to select whatever candidate they desire.16 The Party's only complaint is that it cannot leave the selection of its candidate to persons who are not members of the Party and are unwilling to become members, which does not constitute a meaningful association protected by the First Amendment.
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Justice Stevens dissented on this issue, arguing that the plain language of Article I, § 2, cl. 1, of the Constitution and the Seventeenth Amendment, the intent of the Framers, and the reasoning of the opinions in Oregon v. Mitchell require that every person who votes in a federal election for a Member of the House of Representatives or for a United States Senator must be qualified to vote for candidates to the most numerous branch of the state legislature.17 He concluded that the facial disparity between the qualifications for electors of House and Senate candidates and the more stringent qualifications for electors to the state legislature violates both Qualifications Clauses.18