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Show When Campaign Finance Reform Is Unconstitutional: Remembering James Madison U.S. Senator Robert F. Bennett succinctly or precisely than Madison has. Special interests arise among us because we are free, and, as long as we are free, we will disagree to one extent or another. Madison continues by stating: The inference to which we are brought is,.. .the causes of faction cannot be removed and...relief is only to be sought in...controlling its effects....Relief is supplied by the republican principle.... .. .A pure democracy, by which I mean a society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction__[S]uch democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property. __A republic, by which I mean a government in which the scheme of representation takes place, opens a different prospect, and promises the cure for which we are seeking.... The two great points of difference between a democracy and a republic are: first, the delegation of the government, in the latter, to a small number of citizens elected by the rest; secondly, the greater number of citizens...over which the latter may be extended. Madison explains what he means when he refers to the "greater number of citizens" by telling us, "The influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their particular states, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration through the other states." This was his argument in favor of creating a large, single republic, rather than perpetuating the confederation of a series of relatively small ones. But it is to his first point about the difference between a democracy and a republic that I return. In a pure democracy, every decision is made by the vote of every citizen. In a republic, as Madison says, "The delegation of the government. .. [is] to a small number of citizens elected by the rest...." It is this form of government that the Constitution gives us, and under which we have lived for well over two centuries. What does all this have to do with campaign finance reform? We are faced with a society very different from the one in which Madison lived, particularly with respect to the means that a faction can employ to influence and, on occasion, even control public opinion. Let us take these modern tools of communication and apply them to the model that Madison suggests. Applying Madison's Insights Today to the Issue of Campaign Finance "Reform" Is it possible for a modern special interest, or faction, to create a "conflagration" simultaneously in several states? Given the power of television, national publications, and the Internet, the answer is clearly yes. A special interest group, be it rooted in a labor union, an environmental association, a business alliance, or a religious association, now possesses the means, if it can raise the money needed to employ them, to reach every citizen in the country virtually simultaneously, without regard to any political boundaries or geographical barriers that might exist. Examples of this behavior are all around us. In the 1996 election, the labor unions publicly announced that by increasing the compulsory dues paid by their members, they could raise at least 35 million dollars to be spent in an effort to guarantee that candidates who support their political agenda were elected to the House of Representatives. Various religious organizations, calling themselves the Christian Coalition, banded together and by using the outlets of communication available to them in the churches that belong to the group, set out in the 1994 elections a common message to all of those who are adherents to all of those particular denominations. The same group has repeated that process in the 1996 and 1998 elections. The National Rifle Association, spending the dues paid to it by those who voluntarily join as members, sent broad mailings and purchased advertising time on the electronic media, to make sure that anyone who agreed with its views with respect to gun legislation, would be stimulated to go to the polls and support candidates who are of the same mind. On an issue perhaps closer to home for me as a Senator from Utah, groups of environmental supporters, concerned about a bill introduced by members of the Utah delegation relating to land use in Utah, purchased full-page ads in the major newspapers across the nation urging an outpouring of communication to the Congress seeking defeat of the Utah-based legislation. Madison's statement that "the influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their particular states, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration through the other states," is clearly no longer true. That means we must return to the other "great point of difference between a [direct] democracy and a republic" of which Madison writes-namely "the delegation of the government...to a small number of citizens elected by the rest...." It is through this device, primarily, that we must now find hope for protection against the tyranny of a pure democracy, where a faction, able to temporarily obtain a majority opinion, can then ride over the interest and opinions of the rest of the citizens in society. When he discusses the republican principle, Madison is referring to elected officials. Nonetheless, the same principle applies to campaigns. We do not vote in campaigns as a pure democracy, deciding every issue; instead, we vote our choices among a "small number of citizens" who have offered themselves to serve in public office. Through a process of conventions or primaries or both, we winnow this number down until we make the final choice, through the democratic process, but it is an example of the republican, representative principles nonetheless. The rhetoric we are hearing about the need for campaign reform flies in the face of the Madisonian preference for a 90 |
