Getting Money Out of Politics.
There has been considerable discussion surrounding the corrupting
influence of money in politics. Several sources have developed
proposed Constitutional amendments to minimize the detrimental effect of political
contributions and favors. You will find below a list of some proposed amendments excerpted from the Idiot’s
Guide to the Amendments.. Some of these are already before
Congress. Others are drafts by individuals or groups, conveying what
they consider to be items that they feel should be included in any
formal amendment.
Nothing
Is Perfect. Unfortunately, virtually all of these
proposals have major problems. Several of them limit their
amendments to the issue of corporate personhood and/or specifying
that money is not speech, and nothing else.. Others fail to address
these issues at all. Only a few of them go beyond these concepts to
address getting special interest money out of politics altogether,
and not just out of our elections.
Some are vague or
confusing in their terminology. Almost all of them rely on Congress
to implement the legislation for campaign finance reform, in spite of
the fact that it is the very members of Congress that are heavily
complicit in this abuse of power in our government.
Piecemeal
Approach Likely to Fail. My personal feeling is that
most of these proposals reflect at best a piecemeal approach and only
a first step toward cleaning up the mess we have in Washington.
Almost everything of any true significance that we need to do will
require at least one Constitutional amendment. However, we cannot go
to the people piecemeal with these important items. We need to put
together a total reform package in only one or two amendments, while,
at the same time, keeping them simple and straightforward, so that
average citizens can read and understand them, and who will back
their passage by their federal and state legislators.
Each
title below is also a link to the text of that proposed amendment. I
don't expect you to read every one. However, if you should choose to
read only one, I suggest that it be Wolf PAC Amendments (#28
and #29).
Taken together, they appear to me to be the most comprehensive
package, and they are very clear and easy to comprehend. Here are
brief descriptions of thirteen proposed efforts to cure the ills of
our present system.
OCCUPIED Amendment
Democratic
Congressman Ted Deutch from Florida introduced this amendment in the
House. It is a companion bill to the Saving
American Democracy Amendment in the Senate. It only partly
addresses the Citizen's United ruling by stating essentially that
only non-profit corporations established for business purposes are
not people. It fails to address the issue of money as speech,
government financing of federal elections, or other reforms.
Saving American Democracy Amendment
Independent
Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont introduced an amendment in the
Senate that is a companion bill to and essentially the same as the
OCCUPIED
Amendment in the House.
Get Money Out Amendment
This
amendment was proposed by the Get Money Out organization, which was
started by MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan. Get Money Out merged with the
United Republic group in late 2011. Its content is somewhat similar
to the OCCUPIED
and Saving
American Democracy amendments above. However, it is the only
amendment that calls for election day to be a federal holiday.
Lessig Amendment
This
amendment was proposed by Harvard professor Lawrence Lessig, who also
founded the Rootstrikers
organization. That group merged with the United Republic
organization in late 2011. It provides for government funding of
federal elections, a limit of $100 for “non-anonymized"
contributions, but does not address any limits for “ anonymized”
contributions. It would place limits on independent political
expenditures within 90 days of an election, It indirectly addresses
corporate personhood by specifying that non-natural persons do not
have inalienable rights under the First Amendment of the
Constitution. It does not address the “money is speech” issue.
Wolf PAC Amendments (#28 and #29)
These amendments
were proposed by Wolf PAC, a group started by progressive TV and
radio host Cenk Uygur. Because I think this is the best of the
amendments submitted to date, I am including their entire text below.
The sites also have descriptive explanations of each section at
their respective sites, if you want more information.
Section
1. For all constitutional and legal purposes, entities created by
operation of law are not persons, and do not have the rights of
people.
Section
2. No entity not a person, and no people other than citizens, shall
contribute to any political purpose. All contributions to political
purpose shall be made public, with the name of the contributor and
amount and nature of the contribution, and the name of the recipient.
Section
3. The Congress shall have power to enforce the provisions of this
article by appropriate legislation.
Section 1. Only U.S.
citizens shall be allowed to contribute to a candidate for public
office, or to contribute money to an organization engaged in
influencing the outcome of an election or legislation, or to
contribute money on behalf of or opposed to any type of said
candidates and elected officials, organization, or legislation.
Section 2. No
candidate for any elected office shall be permitted to receive more
than sixteen times the federal hourly minimum wage, in contributions
of any form, excluding volunteer hours, for any purpose, from any
singular citizen of the United States of America during the same
election cycle; all contributions must be fully disclosed in amount
and source.
Section 3. No
appointee or nominee to, or holder of, any office of any government
body shall accept gifts or compensation to their personal accounts
save their duly awarded salary from said government body; they may
receive campaign contributions in a separate campaign account subject
to disclosure.
Section 4. All
campaign expenditures shall be comprised entirely of campaign
contributions. Candidates as private citizens may contribute to their
campaigns within the limits and restrictions of this amendment and
shall be permitted use of personal forms of transportation.
Section 5: All
campaign contributions, to candidates or to organizations engaged in
influencing the outcome of an election, must be raised from the
constituents of the elected office in question.
Section 6. The
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate
legislation.
Udall Amendment
Democratic Senator
Tom Udall of New Mexico, along with eight other Democratic Senators
(Messrs. Bennet, Harkin, Durbin, Schumer, Merkley, Whitehouse,
Begich, and Mrs. Shaheen) introduced this amendment. It is so full
of holes that it is virtually a worthless sham. It doesn't address
the issue of corporate personhood or the use of money as speech. It
adds essentially nothing toward getting money out of politics, except
for what Congress might legislate, and we all know how effective
they have been in the past and will continue to be in the future..
The People's Right's Amendment
Congressman
Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) introduced the amendment with the support of
Free Speech for People,
a non-profit group that aims to end corporate personhood. This
amendment would reverse the Citizen's United decision by the Supreme
Court, but nothing else.
Simmons Amendment
Hip-hop artist
Simmons announced his support for an amendment that would establish
public funding of federal political campaigns and would prohibit any
political contributions from any source. It gives Congress the
authority to design and enforce the public funding system. However,
it does not address the issue of corporate personhood issue or
concept that money is speech. It does, however, specifically
preclude candidates from using their own money for their campaigns.
Edwards Amendment
Introduced by
Representative Donna Edwards (D-Md.), this feeble and useless
proposal has very little merit. It does not directly address
corporate personhood or the concept of money as speech. It refers to
'contributions,' but doesn't define them (financial, in kind,
volunteerism, etc.). Here is the entire content of her vague
amendment:
Section 1. Nothing
in this Constitution shall prohibit Congress and the States from
imposing content-neutral regulations and restrictions on the
expenditure of funds for political activity by any corporation,
limited liability company, or other corporate entity, including but
not limited to contributions in support of, or in opposition to, a
candidate for public office.t:
Section 2. Nothing
contained in this Article shall be construed to abridge the freedom
of the press.
Schrader Amendment
Democratic
Representative Kurt Schrader from Oregon introduced this amendment.
It doesn't directly address the corporate personhood issue and is
silent on the issue of money as speech. It also does not provide for
publicly financed campaigns. Other than those issues, I think this
is one of the better amendments.
Kaptur Amendment
Introduced by
Representative Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), this is another feeble and
useless proposal that has very little merit. Here is the entire
content of her amendment:
Section 1. Congress
shall have power to set limits on the amount of contributions that
may be accepted by, and the amount of expenditures that may be made
by, in support of, or in opposition to, a candidate for nomination
for election to, or for election to, Federal office.
Section 2. A State
shall have power to set limits on the amount of contributions that
may be accepted by, and the amount of expenditures that may be made
by, in support of, or in opposition to, a candidate for nomination
for election to, or for election to, State or local office.
Section 2.Congress
shall have power to implement and enforce this article by
appropriate legislation..
No reference to
corporate personhood. No reference to money as free speech. No
mention of public campaign financing. Lots of other things missing.
She does specifically address both primary and general elections,
something one of the others do.
A
progressive group known as Move
to Amend has proposed an amendment that would overturn Citizen's
United by affirming that corporations are not people, specifically
stating that money is not free speech, approving legislative controls
over campaign spending, and prohibiting candidate's from using their
own money as campaign resources. It does not, however, address
public financing of federal campaigns. Otherwise, it is pretty good.
Renew Democracy Amendment
A
grassroots organization known as Renew
Democracy has proposed amendment that is totally unstructured and
very confusing. It does not directly address the corporate
personhood issue or the “money is speech” issue. It does not
recommend public financing of campaigns as a means of getting money
out of politics. It uses some vague and undefined phrases, as you
will see in the text below, which is the entire text of the
amendment.
The
Renew Democracy Amendment
The right of the
individual qualified citizen voter to participate in and directly
elect all candidates by popular vote in all pertinent local, state,
and federal elections shall not be questioned and the right to vote
is limited to individuals. The right to contribute to political
campaigns and political parties is held solely by individual
citizens. Political campaign and political party contributions shall
not exceed an amount reasonably affordable by the average American.
The rights of all groups, associations and organizations to other
political speech may be regulated by Congress but only as to volume
and not content and only to protect the right of the individual
voter’s voice to be heard.
Summary.
There you have it – the collective effort of thirteen groups, all
seemingly focused on improving our corrupt political system. Some
are better focused than others, and some seem to be blind to the true
nature of the problems that beset us and how to solve them. I think
that somewhere among them are the seeds of political, and not just
electoral, reform.
Conclusion.
It will be a difficult job to get such an amendment through
Congress, but it must be done. It will be difficult to get 38 of our
50 states to ratify such an amendment, but it must be done. The
survival of our democracy is at stake. For the sake of our children
and all who come after them, it must be done.
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