Rohrabacher Mailing Stirs Frank Debate

A few weeks ago, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher used a particularly cost-effective method of introducing himself to the voters of California’s new 45th Congressional District, where he plans to seek election this fall.

At taxpayer expense, the Huntington Beach Republican mailed 150,000 newsletters to residents of the new district, which stretches from Seal Beach to Newport Beach. His name was probably unfamiliar to most of those who received the letter: Every household he targeted lies outside his current district, which runs from the Palos Verdes Peninsula to Huntington Beach.

What Rohrabacher and at least six other California congressmen did is perfectly legal. Members of Congress are specifically permitted to use the frank--their free mailing privilege--to send newsletters not only to current constituents, but also to voters in newly redrawn congressional districts they do not now represent.

Even so, critics argue that the practice gives incumbents an unfair advantage against lesser-known challengers who do not hold office. That is especially true in the new districts, where the incumbents otherwise might have to meet opponents on an equal footing. Rohrabacher’s publicly funded mailing, for example, would have cost a challenger about $18,000.

Amid a growing public backlash against a wide range of congressional perks, some lawmakers say the time has arrived to end this arcane but expensive privilege.

“It’s wrong,” said Rep. William M. Thomas (R-Bakersfield), who has introduced a bill to ban such mailings. “I can think of no justification whatsoever for using taxpayers’ dollars to send unsolicited mass-mail information to people who are not now in a member’s district.”

“We think it’s a perfect illustration of how the frank is being used for campaign purposes,” added Michael McCauley, research director of Congress Watch, the legislative arm of Public Citizen, the consumers’ lobby founded by Ralph Nader.

In a recent survey taken by Roll Call, a semiweekly newspaper that covers Capitol Hill, six California congressmen--out of 22 who responded--said they had engaged in the practice. Another subsequently acknowledged to The Times that he, too, had sent such mass mailings.

In addition to Rohrabacher, those who told Roll Call that they had sent the mailings are Republican Reps. Wally Herger of Roseville, Elton Gallegly of Northridge and Jerry Lewis of Redlands. Lewis is the third-ranking House GOP leader.

Democrats who said they franked outside their districts are Reps. George E. Brown Jr. of Colton and Vic Fazio of Sacramento. Fazio is chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that oversees congressional mailing expenditures.

Subsequently, an aide to Rep. Robert J. Lagomarsino (R-Ventura) said his office had mailed a newsletter to voters outside Lagomarsino’s current district.

One congressional staffer, however, said he believes that the practice is far more pervasive than the Roll Call survey indicates. “From what I understand, it’s widespread,” said the aide, who asked not to be named.

None of Orange County’s four other congressional representatives have used taxpayer money to send mass mailings to voters outside their current districts, according to the members or their spokesmen.

“If there is a legitimate purpose for the frank, this isn’t it,” said Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach). “Frankly, I’d love to send my annual report on the U.S. government to all 250 million Americans, so they could all see what’s going on. But I think I should accept the fact that I’ve earned the task of representing a distinct geographic area.”

A spokesman for Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) said sending franked mailings outside a representative’s current district “clearly goes against the intent of the franking regulation.”

Officials in the offices of Reps. Ron Packard (R-Oceanside), who represents southern Orange County, and William E. Dannemeyer (R-Fullerton), who is giving up his House seat to run for the U.S. Senate, also said their bosses have not sent mass franked mailings outside their districts.

Most defenders of the practice simply pointed to its legality. But Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City), who has not yet mailed to any non-constituents in a new east San Fernando Valley district where he plans to run, said he could make another argument for it.

“There are services a congressional office could provide and would have a high incentive to provide in a new area,” said Berman, who refused to foreclose the option for himself. “On the other hand,” he added, “it could be viewed, particularly by opponents, as an unfair incumbent advantage.”

Some of the lawmakers quickest to take advantage of the franking perk are among those who anticipate the toughest reelection fights this year. Brown and Fazio are considered endangered incumbents, Rohrabacher could have a serious primary challenge, and Gallegly and Lagomarsino at one point faced a possible showdown that has since been averted.

The congressional franking privilege itself predates the creation of the republic. The First Continental Congress in 1774 enacted a law that permitted members to send free mail to inform constituents of their activities. Franking went virtually unregulated for 200 years, until Congress in 1973 began restricting the amount of mail members could send and to whom they could send it.

The first series of reforms continued to allow members of Congress to send unaddressed mass mailings to residents of new districts in which they might run after the district boundaries had been approved.

In 1990, Congress changed the definition of mass mailings, allowing members to send such correspondence only to specific residents who were named on each newsletter. However, the new law permitted lawmakers to continue to send free mail to potential new constituents in redrawn districts. Specifically, the law authorized members to mail to counties contiguous to the county or counties that they currently represent.

Under current law, members of Congress are given an annual franking budget equal to the number of household addresses in their district, multiplied by three and multiplied again by the cost of a first-class stamp. In effect, it permits the equivalent of three first-class mailings to all residential addresses in a lawmaker’s district.

“Incumbents have a number of advantages, and this is one of them,” said Rohrabacher, who added that his office is sending out a second newsletter to voters in the new 45th District.

Nevertheless, the two-term congressman said he would vote for the Thomas bill if it ever gets to the House floor--a prospect that congressional aides deem unlikely. In the meantime, Rohrabacher said he has no plans to stop the mailings until they are outlawed for everyone.

“This is not a loophole. This is something that has been put into the law intentionally by the liberal Democrats who control both houses of Congress,” said Rohrabacher, an outspoken conservative. “I have opposed it, but that doesn’t mean that I should unilaterally refrain from doing something that’s being done . . . by many, many others throughout the country.”

A Rohrabacher aide said the copies of the same newsletter mailed to new voters in the 45th District had previously been sent to constituents in Rohrabacher’s current district.