After Senate victory campaign finance battle shifts to House of Representatives - and White House - includes related article on difference in distribution of funds between congressional incumbents and challengers

As you receive this issue, the House of Representatives is expected to act soon on campaign finance reform legislation. Please call or wire your Representative today. Urge him or her to support strong, effective reform to end the campaign finance scandals in Washington (see Alert, page 46).

Following recent Senate adoption of comprehensive campaign finance reform legislation for the second consecutive year, we have been urging the House to also adopt legislation that, like the Senate bill, would accomplish four crucial goals: 1) dramatically reduce the role of special-interest PAC money; 2) shut down the soft money system that is bringing Watergate-style contributions back into federal elections; 3) limit campaign spending; and 4) provide clean, alternative public resources.

Once again with the strong leadership of Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell (D-Maine) and Sen. David Boren (D-Okla.), the principal sponsors of the reform bill, effective reform legislation, S. 3, was passed by the Senate within the first four months of the new session.

If the House adopts legislation similar to S. 3, Congress can send legislation to President Bush that will protect the integrity of government and dramatically change the way business is conducted in Washington.

BREAKING HOUSE RESISTANCE TO REFORM

Members of the House of Representatives are especially addicted to the present campaign finance system. It provides them with enormous advantages over their challengers -- advantages that have all but taken the competition out of our elections.

During the 1990 elections, for example, House incumbents had a total of $239 million in campaign resources. House challengers had only $38 million -- a 6-to-1 advantage for incumbents. The result: 391 out of 406 House incumbents were returned to office.

An editorial in USA Today just after the 1990 elections noted: "In Tuesday's election, 96 percent of them -- the good and the bad -- miraculously held on to their House and Senate seats despite the worst anti-incumbent sentiment in decades. Only it wasn't a miracle. It was a matter of money."

And central to the overwhelming campaign money advantage held by congressional incumbents is the role played by PACs.

If anyone has any lingering doubts as to whether PAC contributions are given to influence legislative decisions, the following figures should dispel them. In the 1990 House elections, PACs gave incumbents $87 million and only $7 million to their challengers -- a record-level advantage to incumbents of more than 12 to 1. In contrast, all other contributions went to incumbents by a 3-to-1 ratio.

PAC interests are perhaps most vividly demonstrated by the giving patterns of two of the largest PACs in the 1990 elections.

The National Association of Realtors' PAC gave $2.5 million to 399 House incumbents. The Realtors' PAC gave only $27,500 to six challengers.

The American Medical Association PAC gave a total of $1.7 million to 369 House incumbents. The AMA PAC gave only $102,000 to 19 challengers.

The hundreds of members of the House who received contributions from the realtors and the AMA run the entire political spectrum, from the most liberal Democrats to the most conservative Republicans. These individuals had only one thing in common: They were incumbents who could help the two PACs' legislative causes.

In the last Congress, the House passed a campaign finance bill that did not constitute real reform. This year, the opportunity to pass effective legislation in the House has been more promising.

If members of the House fail to enact real reform again this year, history will judge them to have stood with the Charles Keatings of the world on the fundamental question facing our democracy. If, on the other hand, members pass real reform legislation and send it to the White House, then the very same question will face President Bush, who so far has refused to support the reforms necessary to end the campaign finance scandal in Washington.

IT'S TIME FOR PRESIDENT BUSH TO SUPPORT REAL REFORM

President Bush has said he would not support campaign reform legislation for Congress that features spending limits and public financing--the very kind of system he used to become president!

The presidential public financing system was the centerpiece of the landmark reform bill enacted in the wake of the Watergate scandal, and it dramatically changed the way presidental campaigns are financed.

"Public financing confers on presidential candidates the freedom not to grovel," the New York Times has written. The Washington Post has similarly noted that the system has freed presidential candidates from having to "tin-cup it around the country" in search of campaign funds.

While the presidential system has worked, one major problem has developed --a problem that can and must be cured.

In the 1988 presidential elections, both the Bush and Dukakis campaigns raised tens of millions of dollars in very large campaign contributions. The contributions were channeled to state political parties where they were spent to help the presidential campaigns. These contributions, known as soft money, could not legally be given to the presidential candidates, so the presidential campaigns used the state parties as conduits for laundering the contributions, claiming the funds were given by the contributors to help state parties.

Does anyone really believe that Charles Keating, Donald Trump, T. Boone Pickens and the 246 other individuals who gave $100,000 each to George Bush's soft money drive did so because they wanted to strengthen state political parties? These contributions were clearly given to support the presidential candidates, and the presidential candidates clearly understood this.

The New York Times has correctly labeled such contributions "sewer money." They have been used in congressional as well as presidential elections to evade federal contribution limits and must be stopped in future elections. If they aren't, no other campaign reforms are likely to make much difference.

To solve the problems caused by private-influence money in congressional elections, Congress must establish a system of spending limits and public campaign resources for its own races, similar to the presidential system. Without these key reforms, the incessant demands for private money will continue to grow in Congress and so will the flow of influence-seeking campaign contributions.

It's time for President Bush to recognize that he has an obligation to the American people to help solve the overriding government ethics issue of our time, an obligation he is not currently meeting. President Bush must recognize that it's not enough to say he won't support legislation that features spending limits and public financing.

It's time for the president to recognize that we cannot solve the campaign finance problem just by dealing with the PAC issue. The president must recognize that excessive campaign spending, political-party soft money abuses and the need for public campaign resources must also be effectively addressed if we are to achieve real reform.

The opportunity is at hand to end the national scandal in the way we finance our elections and choose our representatives.

It's time for members of the House of Representatives and President Bush to join the Senate in acting to restore the health of our democracy.

COPYRIGHT 1991 Common Cause Magazine
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group