Nexus: Chapman's Journal of Law and Public Policy

As time goes on and big corporations continue to allocate billions of dollars to donate to campaigns, the possible corruption that may result (or has resulted?) cannot be denied. Whether you think a citizen’s right to free speech through donations is a constitutionally protected right or not, the possibility for that right to reach too far and adversely affect the very core of our democracy, the election process, should be a concern of everyone’s. I think we can all agree, something should be done to ensure the sanctity of our election process that today, may almost seem like a circus act.

As children we are all told the stories about how the most honorable, fair and most qualified people will get ahead. We are taught not to cheat, scheme, or lie. If we work hard and do a good job, we will be rewarded. This thought may be difficult even for a child now a days. It may be difficult to tell a child in this generation that she does not need to have the newest, coolest technological toys for people to like her, or the most up-to-the-minute handbag. Its probably hard to tell the boy scout that even though his competitor’s parents bought him the most aero-dynamic kite equipment for the kite flying contest that his homemade one, that took him 20 hours to make all by himself, has a chance of winning. But this IS what our country is supposed to be about. I believe our founding fathers had faith that the American people could filter through the “not-so-honest” competitors and make victorious the honest, hardworking person who puts his or her heart and soul into whatever it is they are doing.

Unfortunately, the times have changed and it seems like you can’t get many places, especially into political positions, without some money. In order to be heard and seen, you need financial backing. You need airtime on television and radio; you need space in newspapers and magazines. The average voter will not seek you out, so you need enough money to be able to infiltrate the average voter’s home through the television, radio, newspaper, magazines, Internet, and every other media outlet there is out there.

Now that we have established that at least some sort of money or financial backing is an absolute necessity for political candidates to have a fighting chance, the next step is to try and figure out what the proper, necessary, and constitutionally allowable ways to regulate the possible consequences. When thinking of possible solutions, I think the best place to start is with what we know.

We know that the first amendment of the constitution guarantees every individual citizen of the United States the right to free speech. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances”. Now we can start brainstorming about different ways to decrease the threat of corruption in our election/campaign process. Here are two different alternatives to the campaign finance reform that I believe should at least be looked at:

Voting with Dollars- In 2004, Bruce Ackerman and Ian Ayres, two Yale Law School professors, wrote a book explaining in detail this public financing plus contribution campaign program. Under this program, every voter not only gets a ballot to vote with but a “Patriot Card” with certain amounts of money to allocate to any candidate or interest group they wish. Just like their vote, the contribution would be anonymous. The advocates for this program believe this will not only level out the playing field, but increase participation in the campaign process by the average voter. If people feel like they actually have a say in the election process (which studies have shown is not the case today), they may be more willing to go out of there way and make sure they are making responsible and educated decisions.

“… It makes campaign finance a new occasion for citizen sovereignty–encouraging Americans to vote with their dollars as well as their ballots and giving renewed vitality to their democratic commitments. Rather than trying to repress the amount of money in politics, which is a great aim of much traditional campaign finance reform, [the] proposal seeks to democratize and diffuse finance–to drown out special-interest money with $5 billion worth of democratic, one-person, $50 votes. In primaries, candidates who generate a lot of interest will get a lot of money, and candidates who don’t, won’t. Consequently, money will support credible primary campaigns in a way that our current system doesn’t”.

One of the clear advantages of this program is that it will (hopefully) engage the American voters to do the research and carefully decide on who or what they wish to endorse. As we all know, most of us are much more careful with OUR OWN money. When we can actually hold a tangible amount of money that is ours to decide what to do with, we will take more responsibility in our decisions, something every voter should be doing anyway. Voting with Dollars believers hope this will eliminate most of the private spending, or at least decrease it’s effectiveness on the American people by giving the ACTUAL most popular candidate a comparable amount of money.

Like any program, there are also disadvantages too. The point of the program is so the contributors can be anonymous, and therefore not be able to pressure the politicians. If the contributors give to a committee and that committee then divides the money up accordingly, and gives it to the appropriate candidate, ideally, the candidate will not know where the money is coming from and therefore is free to stand up for the causes he or she truly believes in, not just what they are being paid to support. This theory isn’t bullet proof though. Its possible promises could still be made. An individual could still make deals with candidates and promise to contribute a certain amount of money if the candidate promises to vote against a certain bill when and if the time comes.

There are going to be pros and cons to any proposal for campaign finance reform but that should not deter us from continuing to search for a solution and brainstorming with each other. And we should keep in mind that the best ideas we have had in this country usually came from when both parties put their heads together for the sake of the country.