Senate Passes Bill to Reform Campaign Funding : Politics: Measure would restrict special donations for congressional elections. But a veto and House opposition could quash it.

The Senate, acting in defiance of a threatened veto by President Bush, passed a Democratic campaign finance reform measure Thursday that would ban contributions by political action committees, limit election spending and provide candidates with some public funding.

The 56-42 vote was the culmination of nearly two weeks of hotly partisan floor debate between Democrats and Republicans over the shape of any congressional effort to restrict special interest funding of congressional campaigns.

But even though Senate Democrats were able to push their bill through, the vote brought Congress no closer to reforming the current campaign finance system. Not only has the President vowed to veto any measure that provides for public funding and spending limits but House Democrats also disagree with the Senate approach.

“This bill has about as much chance of surviving as Saddam Hussein would have at an Army-Navy game,” quipped Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), a leading opponent.

Although the current campaign laws have been blamed for several recent congressional scandals, many members of Congress clearly feel no sense of urgency about remedying the apparent flaws in this system.

While both parties agree that the current system of campaign financing ought to be changed, Republicans are suspicious that the Democratic proposals are intended to eliminate their traditional advantage in fund raising. House Democrats, meanwhile, oppose any measure that would eliminate PAC funding, which accounted for about half of their campaign war chests in the last election.

Republicans charged that the spending limits were designed to keep the GOP in the minority in Congress for years to come. But Sen. David L. Boren (D-Okla.), author of the Senate Democratic measure, insisted that the limits instead would help to narrow a fund-raising advantage of 16 to 1 that Senate incumbents currently have over challengers.

Furthermore, Boren asserted that members of Congress are spending too much time raising millions of dollars for their reelection campaigns. “If we weren’t forced to raise so much money, we could spend more time on the nation’s business,” he said.

The average Senate incumbent currently spends about $4 million to be reelected. But in California, Gov. Pete Wilson is believed to have spent in excess of $20 million in his 1988 bid for reelection to the Senate.

Republicans were particularly hostile to the Democrats’ efforts to provide public subsidies for congressional candidates who abide by the spending limits. It is estimated that these subsidies could cost the taxpayers between $46 million and $300 million a year.

Characterizing it as “food stamps for politicians,” McConnell argued that Americans are opposed to public financing because it would only add to the federal budget deficit.

Democrats countered that Bush, who was elected President in 1988 with public financing, is being hypocritical to oppose such funding for congressional candidates. Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) said that Republican presidential candidates have received $240 million in public financing since it began in 1976.

The Senate-passed measure establishes voluntary campaign spending limits for each state, ranging from $950,000 in North Dakota to $5.5 million in California. But the bill allows for additional spending under some circumstances that could boost the total expenditure by each candidate in California to at least $9.6 million, not including federal funding.

In the primary elections, candidates could spend an additional amount equivalent to two-thirds of the limit in primary elections. They could also spend another 25% in the general election if those funds came in donations of $100 or less from home-state contributors.

Candidates who agreed to abide by these limits would receive government-funded vouchers valued at 20% of their limit to purchase half-price television advertising. They also could do their mailings at one-quarter the usual rate.

While banning PAC contributions to federal candidates, the Senate bill stipulates that, if this ban is declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, PACs then would be permitted to contribute no more than 20% of a candidate’s funding and no more than $1,000 to each candidate. PACs currently are permitted to contribute up to $5,000 to a candidate, and some House incumbents fund their reelections entirely with PAC money.

As a legacy of the recent “Keating Five” scandal, the Democrats proposed a number of restrictions that would have prevented former Lincoln Savings & Loan owner Charles H. Keating Jr. from seeking to buy the influence of five senators in his battle with federal regulators.

Among other things, the measure would prohibit congressional candidates from raising so-called “soft-money” contributions that circumvent federal law because they are funneled through state parties, prohibit members of Congress from raising money for nonprofit groups such as voter registration organizations and restrict the “bundling” of personal checks by special interest lobbyists seeking to buy influence with contributions that exceed the PAC limit.

Although the Senate vote was largely along party lines, five Democrats voted against the bill and five Republicans voted for it. California’s senators, Republican John Seymour and Democrat Alan Cranston, each voted with their parties.