Explain the rising importance of PACs and Super-PACs

The “PAC” acronym stands for “Political Action Committee”, with PACs being significant aspects of the campaign finance aspects of the political system within the US. Regular PACs are subject to spending limits of McCain-Feingold, whereby the maximum they can donate to an individual candidate is $2500. In essence, a PAC's main purpose is to spend regulated "hard money" with the express purpose of opposing or supporting a political candidate. However developments through the judiciary and legislature have allowed for the development of super-PACs. This was primarily a result of Citizens United V FEC, whereby a ban on corporations and labour unions making independent expenditure during campaigns was overturned, subsequently followed by Speechnow.org V FEC, whereby corporation and labour unions were allowed to make unlimited contributions towards campaigns. This has greatly increased importance of PACs within politics, as it led to the emergence of "Super-PACs". There are two types of super-PAC, with these types being the 501 c(4) and the 527 respectively. 501 c(4)s are banned from endorsement or opposition of a specific candidate, instead acting as "social welfare" groups, thus spending significant amounts on issues rather than candidates. These groups are not required to reveal donor lists, thus leading to the development of the term “dark money”, in reference to donations from 501 c(4) organisation. This is in contrast with 527s, which may spend unlimited amounts for the express purpose of defeating or supporting candidates, yet are required to disclose their donor list. These have been referred to by "Centre for Public Integrity" as "shadow political parties" and have significant influence over democratic process as a result. Indeed, Super-PACs spent $546.4 million in the US election of 2012, which equates to slightly less than half of all total spending. Centre for Responsive Politics states that 501 c(4)-type super-PACs outspent 527 super-PACs by a margin of 2:1, demonstrating how 501 c(4) super-PACs whereby donors are not required to disclose their identity are rising, meaning "dark money" increases in importance in US politics in cohesion with the increase in PAC importance. Much of the increase in super-PAC importance is a result of Buckley V Valeo 1976, Citizens United V FEC 2010 and Speechnow.org V FEC 2011, whereby soft money was first created, then re-iterated and deregulated in the Citizens United decision and the Speechnow.org decision respectively. However, prior to its' defeat in the Supreme Court, the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act 2003 did much the increase the important of regular PACs within US politics. This is because, after it was implemented as a congressional statute in an attempt to reduce the level of soft money within US politics, a significant feature of BCRA was to ban independent expenditure by labour unions and corporations, effectively banning soft money. This meant that regular PACs who primarily donated and supported candidates through hard money greatly increased in relevance. This in itself led to an increase in PACs by 400 at the next mid-terms after 2003 in 2006. This demonstrates how PACs and super-PACs are effectively an integral part of the US political system, given that tighter regulation surrounding soft money leads to increase in importance of PACs. This is coupled with the fact that, alternatively, any attempt to regulate hard money leads to an increase in the importance of super-PACs. This thus demonstrates how, in recent years, faulty legislation has coupled with constitutional judgements from the Supreme Court to create a cyclical system where PACs (hard money) and super-PACs (soft money) become de facto beneficiaries of any attempt to regulate the other, and are thus integral to the US political system.