Media lawyer Randy Dryer says the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, signed into law last March by President Bush, will reinvigorate the polls among younger votes and regulate corruption, even if in appearance only.
“Voting percentages are generally down in the younger age group in particular because they feel their voice is being drowned out by money interests. That kind of cynicism is just not healthy in an American democracy,” Dryer said.
When President Bush signed the act into law , it was designed to restructure campaign contributions.
This Monday, Sept. 8, the U.S. Supreme Court will hold a special session for the first time in 25 years to rule on the constitutionality of that act.
“What is at stake fundamentally is our First Amendment right to speak about issues freely,” said Doug Bennett, the executive vice president of Timmons & Company, one of the largest lobbying firms in the nation.
Dryer was joined Wednesday morning at the Hinckley Institute of Politics by Bennett and Kirk Jowers, director of academic affairs and legal counsel to the Campaign and Media Legal Center about the future of money and politics.
The panel also looked at how the 2002 campaign finance reform act could change the face of the political contribution process.
The act bans soft money contributions and prohibits advocacy advertisements 60 days before an election, according to CNN.
It’s that ban on soft money-unlimited and unregulated contributions to national political parties-that opponents of the bill deem unconstitutional.
“We often hear that the system is awash in money. The government is a big enterprise, and if they take 50 cents of every dollar I make, I have a stake in where that money goes,” Bennett said.
Jowers, who is also an adjunct professor at the U, gave the standing room only crowd historical context behind the new law.
“For years, political campaigns were self-financed. Basically, whoever could throw the best kegger had the best shot of winning their local election,” he said.
But that changed in 1904, Jowers said, when President Theodore Roosevelt raised 65 to 90 percent of his money from corporations.
“That’s what drew people out, and that’s when things started to change,” Jowers said.
In 1907, Congress passed the Tillman Act, which made it illegal for corporations to make contributions to political campaigns. In 1947, another law banned that practice for labor unions.
With nearly $1.2 billion spent on federal and municipal state campaigns last year, compared to the $11 billion spent on pornography, Bennett said every dollar raised for a candidate helps.
“Politicians are buying airtime with that money, not houses in the Hamptons,” he said.
According to Jowers, during the first six months of 2003, parties raised more money using hard funds than they did during that same time period in 2001, when both soft and hard money were raised. “If you put $50 into a political party, you become a more active volunteer, because you care,” he said.