QandO

August 25, 2004

Why I oppose McCain-Feingold
Posted by Dale Franks

Robert Samuelson, like many others, now realizes why McCain-Feingold wasn't such a hot idea after all.

The presidential campaign has confirmed that, under the guise of "campaign finance reform," Congress and the Supreme Court have repealed large parts of the First Amendment. They have simply discarded what were once considered constitutional rights of free speech and political association. It is not that these rights have vanished. But they are no longer constitutional guarantees. They're governed by limits and qualifications imposed by Congress, the courts, state legislatures, regulatory agencies -- and lawyers' interpretations of all of the above.

We have entered an era of constitutional censorship. Hardly anyone wants to admit this -- the legalized demolition of the First Amendment would seem shocking -- and so hardly anyone does. The evidence, though, abounds. The latest is the controversy over the anti-Kerry ads by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth and parallel anti-Bush ads by Democratic "527" groups such as MoveOn.org. Let's assume (for argument's sake) that everything in these ads is untrue. Still, the United States' political tradition is that voters judge the truthfulness and relevance of campaign arguments. We haven't wanted our political speech filtered.

Now there's another possibility. The government may screen what voters see and hear. The Kerry campaign has asked the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to ban the Swift Boat ads; the Bush campaign similarly wants the FEC to suppress the pro-Democrat 527 groups. We've arrived at this juncture because it's logically impossible both to honor the First Amendment and to regulate campaign finance effectively. We can do one or the other -- but not both. Unfortunately, Congress and the Supreme Court won't admit the choice. The result is the worst of both worlds. We gut the First Amendment and don't effectively regulate campaign finance.

People like...well...me, were saying this when the law was still just a gleam in Senator McCain's eye. When the bill went to the President's desk, we warned that the things we've seen this election cycle, namely the funnelling of marge amounts of money to 527s would be the logical result, and it would mean more viciously partisan attacks.

Moreover, we warned that it gave the government too much leverage on the right of free speech, and sure enough, now everybody--including the president--is keen to try and shut up the 527 organizations. And the most outrageous thing is that the Supreme Court assented in this gutting of the right of free speech, with hardly a quibble.

Like Inspector Reynaud, everyone is shocked--shocked!--that all this has happened. The washington people all knew that this would be the result of McCain-Feingold, but they signed it anyway. The protections that its clampdowns on free speech provide incumbents (no direct mentions of support for a candidate, no ads 30 days prior to an election, limits on direct, "hard money" contributions, etc.) were too good a treat to pass up. The major campaign finance reform it accomplished was to reform the system so that chellengers would find it almost impossible to finance a successful challenge to an incumbent office holder.

And I, and people like me, were saying all this at the time. The only real campaign finance reform, the one with the fewest unintended consequences, and the one most compatible with our constitutional liberties, is to let people give as much money as they want, to any candidate they want, with the proviso that all such donations are public knowledge, cannot be given anonymously, and must be immediately reported to the public.

All you guys on the Left were piously droning on about the corrupting effects of money, and the other drivel that Senators McCain and Feingold were spouting. The necessity of its passage became an article of faith among Democrats. You ignored warnings that it gutted the first amendment. You ignored warnings that 527s would just take up the slack in soft-money spending. No, you had your starchy white ideal of utopia, and you weren't gonna be happy 'til you got it, and thank God that there are a few Republicans, like Senator McCain, who, unlike the rest of his party, knows how to do the right thing.

Well, you got it. And what has it given you this election year? The Swiftvets.

So, how does campaign finance reform taste now? Does it taste good? Is it yummy? I hope so, because now you're just gonna have to suck on it for a while.

Enjoy.

By the way, I hear the Swiftvets are working on a new ad.

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