Giving the Rascals a Real Fight : The importance of campaign finance reform

Indignation at the existence of a “ruling class” of de facto senators- and representatives-for-life has fueled a nationwide term-limits movement aimed at elected officials--first in state legislatures and more recently in Congress. The passage of Proposition 140 has limited the terms of California’s legislators. In the state of Washington, Initiative 573 was to have had the same effect on that state’s U.S. senators and representatives.

On Thursday, however, U.S. District Judge William L. Dwyer ruled that Initiative 573 was invalid. The U.S. Constitution does not impose term limits, and only by an amendment to the Constitution, Judge Dwyer’s opinion stated, can limits be imposed. The ruling applies only to the state of Washington, but its implications extend to and beyond the states where similar term-limit measures have been enacted or are pending. In due course it will reach the docket of the U.S. Supreme Court, where, given the clarity of the Constitution on this matter, the ruling is almost certain to be upheld.

DAUNTING TASK: At that point, backers of term limits for federal legislators will face amending the Constitution, a task that the Founding Fathers deliberately made difficult. If support for federal term limits remains high, proponents should eventually succeed. There are two reasons the inevitable delay may be beneficial.

First, the opponents of term limits have argued that this change would make government less, rather than more, responsive to the citizenry as well as more susceptible to corruption. The opponents may be wrong, but we need not speculate for too long. Results will soon be coming in from the 15 states that have imposed term limits. Those states may be seen as laboratories whose experiments will provide invaluable data for the coming debate about the more momentous federal change.

Second, with term limits now seriously postponed, throwing the rascals out by electing their opponents remains the voters’ best defense. Unfortunately, campaign financing law heavily favors incumbents over opponents, and, needless to say, most incumbents like that.

HOUSE CLEANING: But representatives who are serious about wanting to “clean the House” have the means at hand. H.R. 823, a campaign reform bill drafted by Rep. John Bryant (D-Tex.), would reform lobby disclosure laws and restrict the gifts and miscellaneous freebies that lobbyists provide our lawmakers. The bill has loopholes we would like to see eliminated, notably one that provides an exception to the ban on gifts from lobbyists if the gifts arise from “personal friendship.” (Some deep-pocket lobbyists have never seen a lawmaker they didn’t want to befriend.) But amendments have been offered to close some of the loopholes, and on balance this bill would do much to halt the sale of legislators to the highest campaign-funding bidder.

If and when the Constitution is amended to limit congressional terms, this reform would be the best possible complement to the amendment. Until then, it is the best possible alternative.