The tidal wave of money flowing into the presidential campaign is a powerful demonstration of the need for fundamental changes in the way we fund our elections, not proof of the health of the private contribution system. Politicians and their supporters will spend $5.3 billion on races, and raise the vast majority of those funds from large donors seeking their favor, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

Less noted is the success of the Clean Elections programs, or full public financing, that have been implemented in seven states and two cities. Clean Elections is a proven policy successful in the states where it’s been implemented. Elections in these Clean Elections states are about voters and ideas instead of the endless campaign money chase.

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) may have put the final nail in the coffin of the present antiquated presidential public financing system when he opted out of it for both the primary and general campaigns and raised more than $600 million through September.
Some say Obama’s success proves that public financing of elections is a dead idea. That’s far from the case. Sen. Obama is the exception, not the rule.

The danger is to take Obama’s ability to generate so much of his funds from small donors, possibly as much as 50 percent, and use it to justify our current campaign finance practices where big donors rule. In comparison, donations of $200 or less accounted for 31 percent of the funds of Democratic rival Sen. Hilary Clinton (D-N.Y.), and 32 percent of those of former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.). In the 2004 election, President Bush raised 31 percent of his money from these smaller donations.

U.S. HOUSE
Candidates for the U.S. House raised 10 percent of their funds from donations of $200 or less through March 31 in the 2008 election cycle, down from 15 percent at the same time in 2000, according to the Campaign Finance Institute. In contrast, donations of $1,000 or more accounted for 35 percent of individual contributions in the current election cycle, up from 23 percent in the 2000 cycle.

U.S. SENATE
In the 2000 election U.S. Senate candidates raised 28 percent of their funds through donations under $200. In 2006, that fell to 16 percent. Instead, individual contributions of $1,000 or more accounted for 40 percent of contributions in 2006, compared with 26 percent in 2000.

The numbers make it clear: candidates who are serious about winning are forced to spend ever more time soliciting contributions from wealthy donors and deep-pocketed interest groups, bypassing, or outright ignoring, the vast majority of citizens.

Clean Elections systems offer an alternative.

A Clean Elections candidate must get a set number of modest donations—usually five dollars—from people in their community in order to qualify for a grant. Once qualified, the Clean Elections candidate adheres to strict spending limits and stops accepting private contributions. That means the donation from the teacher is as important as the one from the corporate CEO.

In Connecticut, 75 percent of statehouse candidates are running under the program, remarkable considering this is the first general election during which Clean Elections were in effect. In Arizona, 9 out of 11 statewide officeholders, including Gov. Janet Napolitano (D-Ariz.), have run and won under this new approach. Maine implemented the system in 2000 and today 84 percent of its legislature is elected using the Clean Elections program.

On Capitol Hill a bipartisan bill called the Fair Elections Now Act, has been introduced in the Senate by Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) and in the House by Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) and Rep. Walter Jones, Jr. (R-N.C.)

By requiring candidates to raise a large number of small donations to qualify for funds, it brings ordinary citizens back into elections and reduces the need to raise ever larger amounts of money. That appeals both to voters and to candidates.

Yes, Obama is a phenomenon. But his success doesn’t mean the problem with money in politics has evaporated. We need Clean Elections to reduce candidates’ reliance on big donations.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 29th, 2008 at 3:04 pm and is filed under Uncategorized .