Real campaign-finance reform: Ban all paid political advertising in the U.S.

[KingOrfeo]

What we need to do is make it not merely difficult but impossible for anybody (including the candidates themselves) to affect the outcome of any election by spending money on it. Our only alternatives are that and a de facto plutocracy, which is what we've got now. The 1% have more than enough economic power, without allowing them to wield political power out of proportion to their numbers on top of that.

And I say we do not need to scrap or even amend the First Amendment to do it (though I might well support a constitutional amendment to effect this, if strictly necessary, and depending on the wording). We need only get a SCOTUS in place that will accept the plain fact that money is not speech and will overturn such contrary decisions as Buckley v. Valeo.

From The Next American Nation, by Michael Lind (The Free Press, 1995), pp. 256-259 (from before the McCain-Feingold Bill, but I don't think the picture has changed all that much since it passed):

Campaign financing is by far the most important mechanism for overclass influence in government. The real two-party system in the United States consists of the party of voters and the tiny but influential party of donors. The donor party in the United States is made up of an extraordinarily small number of citizens. In 1988, according to one study, only 10.2 percent of the American public made a contribution to a candidate, party, or partisan group. . . . The group of large political donors is a still more exclusive club. According to a study by Citizen Action, in the 1989-90 election cycle only 179,677 individual donors gave contributions greater than $200 to a federal candidate, political action committee (PAC), or party: "Thirty-four percent of the money spent by federal candidates was directly contributed by no more than one-tenth of one percent of the voting age population." One may reasonably doubt that this one tenth of one percent is representative of the electorate or the population at large.

<snip>

Special interests buy favors from congressmen and presidents through political action committees (PACs), devices by which groups like corporations, professional associations, trade unions, investment banking groups -- can pool their money and give $10,000 per election to each House and Senate candidate. Today there are more than 4,000 Political Action Committees (PACs) of various kinds registered with the Federal Election Commission; in 1974, when they were sanctioned by law, there were only 500. PAC money is driving campaign costs to new heights. In 1992, the average Senate incumbent spent more than $3.6 million for re-election; that is the equivalent of raising $12,000 a week in a single six-year term. Members of Congress, by comparison, spend only an average of $557,403 to be re-elected -- a "mere" $5,000 a week for a two-year term. The average cost of a House campaign has risen to this level from $140,000 in 1980 -- and $52,000 in 1974.

The chief beneficiaries of rising campaign costs and PAC contributions have been incumbents. In 1972, 52 cents of the average PAC dollar went to incumbents, compared to 25 cents to challengers (the rest went to candidates for open seats); in the 1988 House elections, incumbents received 84.4 cents of each PAC dollar and challengers only 8.6 cents. It makes more sense for lobbies to buy access to established members of Congress and senators -- particularly those with important leadership positions -- than to fund challengers, who, if elected, would have no seniority and little influence. . . . Former Senator Barry Goldwater has lamented, "The Founding Fathers would frown in their graves if they saw us rationing candidacies sheerly on the basis of money: who has -- or can raise -- the millions necessary to run for office."

Democrats, when they were members of the majority party, received more PAC money than Republicans, though both parties are saturated with it. Contrary to conservative claims that liberal lobby groups dominate Congress, PAC funds come overwhelmingly from business: in 1990, 65 percent of PAC contributions came from business PACs, compared to 24 percent from labor and only 11 percent from ideological groups (including conservative as well as liberal pressure groups). "At one point," John Judis has pointed out, "the American Petroleum Institute employed more lobbyists in Washington than the entire labor movement."

They don't come much more libertarian than Goldwater, and even he was appalled at this state of affairs.

From the same book, pp. 311-313:

Today's U.S. government is democratic in form but plutocratic in substance. . . . In a misguided 1976 decision, Buckley v. Valeo, the Supreme Court held that Congress could not limit spending by rich Americans promoting their own candidacies. This decision was to the equalization of voting power what Dred Scott was to abolitionism. In The Yale Law Review, Jamin Raskin and John Boniface have argued that political candidates in the United States must win a "wealth primary." Candidates without enormous amounts of money, either from their own fortunes or from rich individuals and special interest groups, cannot hope to win the party primaries -- much less general elections. Indeed, the Buckley decision is one reason why more than half the members of the Senate today are millionaires. . . .

It is time to build a wall of separation between check and state. Curing the disease of plutocratic politics requires a correct diagnosis of its cause: the costs of political advertising. The basic problem is that special interests buy access and favors by donating the money needed for expensive political advertising in the media. Elaborate schemes governing the flow of money do nothing to address the central problem: paid political advertising. Instead of devising unworkable limits on campaign financing that leave the basic system intact, we should cut the Gordian knot of campaign corruption by simply outlawing paid political advertising on behalf of any candidate for public office. The replacement of political advertising by free informational public service notices in the electronic and print media would level the playing field of politics and kill off an entire parasitic industry of media consultants and spin doctors.

An outright ban on paid political advertising and the imposition of free time requirements on the media are radical measures, but nothing less is necessary if we are to prevent our government from continuing to be sold to the highest bidders. The argument against strict public regulation of money in politics is based on a false analogy between free spending and free speech protected under the First Amendment. The analogy is false, because limits on campaign finance do not address the content of speech -- only its volume, as it were. It is not an infringement on free speech to say that, in a large public auditorium, Douglas will not be allowed to use a microphone unless Lincoln can as well.*

*A much more compelling analogy would be between the electoral process and the judicial system, with the electorate playing the role of the jury. In our system of trial by jury, there are elaborate rules governing the presentation of evidence to the jury by plaintiff and defendant (the "candidates"). If our judicial system were organized the way our judicial system is, then rich candidates would be allowed to buy time before the jury. Texas Senator Phil Gramm, in one Senate election, outspent his opponent by 300 to 1; the equivalent, in the judicial system, would be allowing a rich defendant to buy, say, six months to present his side of the case, while the poor plaintiff might be able to purchase only twenty minutes for his side.

N.B.: This relates only to advertising, not editorializing. Media outlets would remain free to editorialize, Fox News and MSNBC would be free to continue politicizing the news each in its own way, etc. The Equal-Time Rule and the Fairness Doctrine are topics for a different debate; in any case, their scope is limited to airwave-broadcast media, not print, cable, or Internet media.

Bear in mind that there are other democracies, such as France, where every candidate in an election gets an equal ration of free air time and no other political advertising is allowed, and we over here still tend to think of those countries as "free countries."

"Wall of separation between check and state" is, at least, something you can get on a bumper-sticker.

FWIW, some Wikiquotes on campaign-finance reform:

Today's political campaigns function as collection agencies for broadcasters. You simply transfer money from contributors to television stations. Senator Bill Bradley, 2000.

We've got a real irony here. We have politicians selling access to something we all own -our government. And then we have broadcasters selling access to something we all own — our airwaves. It's a terrible system. Newton Minow, former Federal Communications Commission chairman (2000).

You're more likely to see Elvis again than to see this bill pass the Senate. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) (1999) on the McCain-Feingold Bill on Campaign Reform

Unless we fundamentally change this system, ultimately campaign finance will consume our democracy. Representative Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) (1996).

[Buckley v. Valeo is] one of the most weakly reasoned, poorly written, initially contradictory court opinions I've ever read. Senator (and former federal district court judge) George J. Mitchell (D-ME) (1990).

We don't buy votes. What we do is we buy a candidate's stance on an issue. Allen Pross, executive director, California Medical Association's PAC (1989).

Political action committees and moneyed interests are setting the nation's political agenda. Are we saying that only the rich have brains in this country? Or only people who have influential friends who have money can be in the Senate? Senator Barry Goldwater (R-AZ) (1988).

The day may come when we'll reject the money of the rich as tainted, but it hadn't come when I left Tammany Hall at 11:25 today. George Washington Plunkett (1905).

Who are to be the electors of the federal representatives? Not the rich, more than the poor, not the haughty heirs of distinguished names, more than the humble sons of obscure and propitious fortune. James Madison, Federalist 57 (1788).

 

[KingOrfeo]

And it's gonna be a whole lot worse this year. GOP superPACs are planning to spend $1 billion.

 

[phrodeau]

Turn off your television.

 

[unregistered]

 

[KingOrfeo]

The Stalinist KO wants to cancel the First Amendment.

Money != speech. And freedom of speech != the freedom to buy the most time on the loudest amplifier in the room.

 

[unregistered]

 

[derpybody]

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[bra_man69]

Money != speech. And freedom of speech != the freedom to buy the most time on the loudest amplifier in the room.

It's all about the money if you don't like it get more money then them.

 

[KingOrfeo]

Yep this America, you don't like it move to North Korea and listen to the state drone on about the wonders of Iron Hand Leader For Life. You won't have to worry about minor technicalities like freedom.

I'm all for a fair level playing field for everybody, even Libertarians.

 

[rider81]

A few first amendment issues with this one.

How about unlimited contributions but every contribution has to be posted on the internet, same day as received, with name and address. No front organizations allowed.

 

[richard_daily]

Yep this America, you don't like it move to North Korea and listen to the state drone on about the wonders of Iron Hand Leader For Life. You won't have to worry about minor technicalities like freedom.

buying an election is the opposite of freedom.

 

[Ham Murabi]

I'm having a hard time understanding how a free country can limit how much money I choose to donate to a candidate.

 

[Bert Notorius]

The GOP has to outspend the Dems 10:1 just to offset the free liberal media coverage.

 

[KingOrfeo]

I'm having a hard time understanding how a free country can limit how much money I choose to donate to a candidate.

You should spend more time trying to understand why a candidate should need your money in the first place.

 

[pete]

i'd be more in favor of taking campaign funding out of individual's and corporation's hands altogether, and lettting the fed gov't provide a limited amount for each party candidate, period.

if people want to contribute money it can go to the political party they choose, and not any particular candidate directly.

 

[Ham Murabi]

You should spend more time trying to understand why a candidate should need your money in the first place.

I clearly understand. Congress has worked its way into every facet of American life, and plenty of that money is spent just to be left alone or for tax breaks.
If the U.S. had the limited government in place before Wilson, the need to donate to candidates would shrink dramatically.

 

[BoyNextDoor]

What we need to do is make it not merely difficult but impossible for anybody (including the candidates themselves) to affect the outcome of any election by spending money on it.

Why? How can you possibly live in an economy dominated by Capitalism and have this be the case?

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

The Romans bought elections and they were much freer than us in many ways. Of course, they bought elections by having politicians hand out bribes to voters. It was a different sort of electoral purchase. Granted, they had slavery, but then the existence of a State is itself slavery, in that you don't choose your servitude to the State and all of the arguments used to justify the existence of the State could also be used by pro-slavery advocates.

 

[Hubs_in_hose]

We are going about this the wrong way. There does not need to be a limit on what people can donate to campaigns. The individual limits are what drives the extra-campaign groups to gather all this money and launch the negative ads. If the limits were off the candidate and they had to advertise who was donating (like a NASCAR racing suit) then people could see who is bought and paid for.

As an aside, if the Republicans and Democrats would allow effective third parties then there would be a better spread of money and more of an effort for bipartisanship in government

 

[Liar]

As an aside, if the Republicans and Democrats would allow effective third parties then there would be a better spread of money and more of an effort for bipartisanship in government

It's not the Republicans and Democrats fault. The problem is the setup of the legislative chambers. As long as one district elect one representative by majority, two parties are what you're stuck with.

 

[Liar]

Are there today things that are legal to sell but illegal to advertise for?

For instance, ads for booze, hardcore porn and guns on tv-shows for kids. Is that legal?

If it's not legal, commercial speech is already being limited. So how would it them be unconstitutional to limit it more?

Also, those long harangues about all the possible side effects that one has to read in drug commersials, isn't that an infringment on free speech? Can we require that all political ads are accompained by the same kind of disclaimer?

"Warning, voting for Senator Whathisface may result in, but is not limited to the following: Political gridlock, habitual infrigments of civil liberties, surprise policies not declared in campaign, his annoying face appearing more often on Meet The Press, an influx of lobbyist power, a general sense of shame from having that asshole representing your state, a possible sex and/or money laundering scandal, and random ulcers."

 

[busybody..]

Stfu, foreign Nigger

 

[busybody..]

sorta kinda funny

Hussein Soetoro goes to dozens of FUND RAISERS

and all is well

ONE MONTH ROMNEY RAISES MORE....THE LIBZ SCREAM BLOODY MURDER


STFU, NIGGERS, go back to your hole

 

[richard_daily]

i'd be more in favor of taking campaign funding out of individual's and corporation's hands altogether, and lettting the fed gov't provide a limited amount for each party candidate, period.

if people want to contribute money it can go to the political party they choose, and not any particular candidate directly.

That makes sense, but I'd say that the right wing would throw a fit over this... and decalare it....


SOCIALISM!!!!!!...


even thought it has about as much to do with socialism as an escrow account.

 

[KingOrfeo]

Why? How can you possibly live in an economy dominated by Capitalism and have this be the case?

WTF? Why should capitalism translate into the ability to buy elections?!