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HISTORY OF FEDERAL ELECTIONS CAMPAIGN
FINANCE REFORM
Public
financing of Congressional elections has been proposed in nearly
every Congress since 1956. We began publicly funded presidential
elections in 1976.The
1971 Federal Election Campaign Act, F.E.C.A., as amended in 1974,
1976, and 1979, imposed limits on contributions, required disclosure
of campaign receipts and expenditures, and set up the Federal Elections
Commission (FEC) as a central administrative and enforcement agency. In
1976 the U.S. Supreme Court, in Buckley v. Valeo, ruled that ‘money
equals free speech’. This ruling invalidated the F.E.C.A.
limitation on independent expenditures, on candidate expenditures,
and on overall campaign expenditures.
These provisions, the Court
ruled, placed direct and substantial restrictions on the ability
of candidates, citizens, and associations to engage in protected
First Amendment free speech rights. The Court saw no danger of corruption
arising from large expenditures, as it did from large contributions,
and reasoned that corruption alone could justify the First Amendment
restrictions involved. Corruption alone justifies First Amendment
restrictions. If
large expenditures were not considered a corrupting influence in
our federal elections campaigns in 1976, only a legislator, a lobbyist,
and their plutocrat financiers would make such a contention in 2006.
Corruption alone mandates First Amendment restrictions. Corruption
alone requires control of independent expenditures. Corporations
are not people. People have societal needs. Corporations’
needs are based on profit. For the public good, money cannot equal
free speech. Through
the 1980s Political Action Committees’ contributions grew
400% in constant dollars, from $12.5 million in 1974 to $147.8 million
in 1988. From 1986 to 1990, Congress worked to include voluntary
spending limits, combined with inducements to participate, such
as public subsidies or cost reduction benefits.
These spending limits
and public subsidies fell victim to party polarization, inter-party
bickering, filibusters, and a presidential veto. Congress debated the necessity of establishing a Constitutional
Amendment mandating comprehensive federal campaign finance reform
in 1988, 1995, 1997, 2000, and 2001. In each debate individual and
corporate interest prevailed over the interests of public good.
In each debate, the Constitutional Amendment for establishing comprehensive
Federal Elections Campaign Finance Reform was defeated. In
1999, reform supporters succeeded in passing the Shays-Meehan bill
in the House. Senate sponsors of its companion McCain-Feingold measure
failed on three occasions to break a filibuster in opposition. No
vote occurred in the Senate.
In 2000 the House passed the Shays-Meehan
Bill, but the Senate filibustered the McCain-Feingold Bill, again
sending it into limbo. A legislative bill must pass both the House
and Senate to become law.The
Senate passed S. 27 (McCain-Feingold) on April 02, 2001 by a 59-41
vote, following a two-week debate which added 22 amendments. On
February 13, 2002 the House passed again the Shays-Meehan Bill,
H.R. 2356, by 240-189 after including four amendments. Finally,
in 2002 the 107th Congress enacted the Bipartisan Campaign Reform
Action of 2002 (BCRA). As the 108th Congress began in 2003, the
political community was adjusting to the new law that took effect
on November 6, 2002.
This
new federal law is equivalent to gun control legislation that allows
a twelve year old to purchase an Uzi machine gun without identification. Good
amendment provisions which would have reformed the presidential
public funding system, provided candidates and parties with broadcast
discounts, replaced the Federal Elections Commission with a new
enforcement agency, and other well thought out reforms, were gutted
by the Senate. The 22 added amendments created so many loopholes,
that the new Bipartisan Campaign Reform Action of 2002 is as useful
in reforming campaign contributions, as a sieve is to carry water.
Hard money fundraising limits doubled with the passage of McCain-Feingold.
After 15 years of public demands that the federal elections campaign
financing system be reformed, this is best our legislative representatives
in Congress can do. Shall
we allow these bribed Congressmen another attempt to reform their
corrupt federal election campaign financing system? Their time for
half measures and talk has passed.
Good Senators and good House
members are afraid to fight individual and corporate interest demands.
They know if they fight, they will be targeted for defeat in the
next election cycle. The individual and corporate paymasters own
the ‘Peoples House’. For
thirty years, from the 1971 passage of FECA, to the election reforms
in 1974, 1976, and 1979, and to the ten years in the making of the
McCain-Feingold laws, the attempts by Congress at creating a
fair and honest federal elections campaign finance system have miserably failed.
The reason they have failed is there are too many individual and
corporate interest involved in creating such legislation. The legislation
is filled with loopholes that have allowed even more individual
and corporate monies into our federal elections. Congress not only
failed to create Federal Elections Campaign Finance Reform, they
complicated the intent of Federal Law.
To
analyze these new regulations (BCRA, 2002), a special three-judge
panel felt it necessary to issue an unheard of 1600 page opinion.
A sharply divided Supreme Court then issued a 208 page opinion,
leaving many complex issues unresolved. After all these failings,
legislative machinations and legal doublespeak, our federal campaign
finance system is more corrupt than ever. What
we need is a little common sense. What we need is simplicity. The
measured word. Brief declarative sentences of absolutism. This is
a political problem. Political problems are remedied by legislation.
Our citizenry shall disqualify Congress, convene an ad hoc National Convention to legislate federal elections campaign finance law directly, ad hoc special state conventions shall ratify that legislation, and our citizenry shall enact that legislation through a national vote.
As
we have seen, the People are the Sovereign. The people have the
Constitutional power to legislate and make law. Mostly, the people
use their representatives to legislate and make law, but many times
they do not. The people may alter and adapt the government to conform
to the public good. If necessary, the people may alter and adapt
their constitution to conform to the public good.
All across our
country, in approximately 30% of our states, citizens do alter and
adapt their state constitutions to conform to the public good. In
an additional 30% of our states, citizens’ legislators draft
legislative amendments, qualify them for state ballots, and enact
them by direct vote of citizens. What could be more democratic?
They are compelled to these initiative and referendum actions to
protect the public good from individual and corporate interests,
which sometimes control their state legislatures. Approximately
40% of our states are without these most basic tools of democracy.
The people in these states want federal elections campaign finance
reform. These conditions predicate a national vote to solve a national
problem.
It
is the sovereign right of any nation to solve a national problem
through a national vote. A national vote enacting federal elections
campaign finance reform. A national vote enacting a constitutional
amendment. We must use our own judgments, our own wills, in determining what
is most beneficial for our society, and create a remedy for the
public good. In selecting our method of campaign financing, let us pare down
the existing campaign financing rot, and then build up a better
and improved method. Many
campaign financing methods are unhealthy for our society. Some of
these are bundling, independent expenditures, issue advocacy, 527
political organizations, soft money, and national party spending.
These and other methods of financing federal elections campaigns
will not be allowed in our legislative amendment. Our legislative
amendment must begin anew. A series of
U.S. Supreme Court rulings mandates our legislative amendment to
be a constitutional amendment.
The 1886 ruling, in Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad,
derived Corporation Personhood, even though the Court did not make
a ruling specifically on Corporate Personhood (the 14th amendment
was intended for protecting former slaves rights, not corporation
rights). This ruling
that gave corporations rights under the 14th Amendment, and all
subsequent Supreme Court Rulings that gave corporations rights under
the Bill Of Rights (Appendix A), shall be abolished. Our Constitution
does not allow corporate rights. Supreme Court Judges, who once
were corporate attorneys for the ‘robber barons’, created
these judge made corporate rights. Only
a constitutional amendment, legislated by our National Convention, ratified by ad hoc special states conventions, and enacted by a national vote, can abolish
the Supreme Court’s rulings of Corporate Personhood, and Money
Equals Free Speech doctrines. If our republic is to survive, corporations
cannot be considered people, and money cannot equal free speech
in the political arena. We shall disqualify Congress, legislate, ratify, and enact our Molly Ivins Constitutional Amendment, ending Constitutional Rights for artificial corporations, and
establishing public funding for federal elections.
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