Adam Bonin writes in the Philadelphia Inquirer about the need, despite a hostile Supreme Court, for public funding systems throughout the country.
The majority's rationale rested on the notion that leveling electoral opportunities for less-wealthy candidates was not a legitimate government objective. That's a shame, because the smalldonor revolution that propelled Obama's presidential campaign has not yet reached the state or local levels.
To reform this system, states such as Arizona, Connecticut and Maine have implemented innovative methods to allow candidates to receive a public grant that covers campaign costs in exchange for forgoing private fund-raising.
In order to ensure a fair contest, candidates participating in the system can receive additional grants if their non-participating rivals or outside groups supporting them end up spending funds in excess of the public grant.
The result: a legislature that is more economically diverse than one that proceeded it - with diner waitresses and social workers now joining chambers once reserved for the well-connected - and one that is not beholden to special interests or entrenched wealth.
More on that topic: the
New York Times praised the high participation from candidates in the newly-created Connecticut public funding system, which goes into effect this year. Over 65% of candidates have opted in, and more may join them -- only 10 out of over 300 candidates have said they won't be running publicly-funded.
Public financing encourages good governance as well as competition. Government is cleaner when lawmakers are not beholden to special interests and are free to spend their energy meeting the needs of the people who matter -- those who elected them.
Connecticut, which became known as "Corrupticut" after the recent scandals, can only benefit from this new system.
What kind of impact does Clean Elections have on the participants in our democracy? A big one -- even greater than what we previously knew, thanks to Public Campaign's new study out this week, "
All Over the Map: Small Donors Bring Diversity to Arizona's Elections." They looked at the donors in statewide races covered by the state-level Clean Elections program in Arizona and compared them to the donors in federal races for Senate, which have the same statewide electorate but currently have no public funding or Clean Elections option.
The difference is striking: from race and ethnicity to economic and geographic levels, the Clean Elections donors represent a much wider and more representative mix of citizens. Again, the executive summary is
here.
The trend continues in the presidential race. As the Campaign Finance Institute's analysis of April fundraising numbers shows, small donors constitute a substantial majority of the recent financial support for Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
Both Democratic candidates raised more than half of their April funds in increments of $200 or less. John McCain remains dependent on large donors for the majority of his support. This does not tell the whole story -- after all, all three candidates relied on major donor support to launch their campaigns -- but it portends an exciting six months leading up to the November election. Hopefully more and more small donors buy into the presidential election process with a contribution and feel a greater stake in the outcome.
As I've noted in the past, this shouldn't be confused with trends in the races for Congress, which are moving in the opposite direction, where major donors dominate and small donors are "not a factor." We need Clean Elections-style public financing for Congress now more than ever.
I'm cross posting a piece here on small donors, which I worked with our president Bob Edgar to put together, looking at the trends in small donor giving this cycle for presidential and congressional candidates -- the two are very different -- and how that impacts our work to limit big money's role and engage more people in our political system.
Check it out below the fold.
We've seen a lot of coverage of the public financing/campaign finance debate recently. The main drive has been from the Obama-McCain will they/won't they grist mill and the small donor "revolution" theory. Our colleague at the Brennan Center, Laura MacCleery posted a great blog on Huffington Post today about these issues:
But it will not help us move forward if enthusiasm for this influx of small donors obscures the facts. Money from large donors is not exactly going the way of the dinosaurs -- 79 bundlers for Obama have hit up their friends for aggregate contributions of $200,000 each. Still, it is certainly indisputable that having more small donations and less reliance on a tiny pool of wealthy people is a happy development in a democracy.
I very much agree. Small donors are good for democracy, it's a sign of ordinary people participating in the system, and these people are likely to get more involved in the grassroots. Just as politicians who raise money in the current system are not bad people (the vast majority are excellent people and in politics for the common good), people are generally good and are giving small donations with noble motivations. The problem is, the system is still broken. Money still buys power. Most people don't have money. Most people don't and can't give money.
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