Dec. 27, 2005
Always, Follow the Money
By J. Barlow Herget
RALEIGH - What are we doing to ourselves? When will we get fed up and not take it anymore?
I'm talking about this corrupting, oozing money culture that is swallowing our democracy. It's in Washington and North Carolina and, as the song says, all over this land.
I know, I know. There've been scandals in the past. And if you still read history, you know the Robber Barons knew how to buy a politician as well as Enron's Ken Lay.
But this year has been one numbing shame after another.
North Carolina's own Congressman Frank Ballance, a Democrat from Warren County, is going to jail for graft, some of which he spent on his campaigns.
Republican Congressman Randy Cunningham of San Diego is going to jail, too. He took millions from defense contractors who gave generously to his campaigns in exchange for more millions in government contracts. He lived lavishly under the noses of the House Ethics Committee and a dozing Washington media. He was both a hypocrite and stupid.
Former Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas is smarter. (The courts will decide if he is any greedier.) Since 1995, he has raised at least $35 million for his campaigns, his PACs, and his own Texas charity, according to a recent Associated Press investigation.
To avoid Cunningham's fate, DeLay wisely gets non-profits, scholarship funds, and special interests to pay for his luxurious lifestyle as legitimate business expenses.
He also puts his wife and daughter on his payrolls. Since 2001, the two have made over $500,000 as paid staff for his charity and campaigns. Nice work if you can get it.
Here in the North Carolina General Assembly, we've seen how special interest money has flowed into political campaigns in ever-larger amounts. The current federal and state investigations into Democratic House Speaker Jim Black's office are knee-deep in questionable campaign contributions.
Former Rep. Michael Decker, R-Forsythe, received a generous contribution from Black after Decker switched his party affiliation. The change reduced the Republican majority to a tie and produced a co-speakership in which Black was half.
One of the companies bidding on the state lottery contract, Scientific Games, paid Black's former political director to lobby for its interests.
To be fair, Black has played the campaign contribution game by the book . . . so far. His actions, like many of our elected politicians, broke no laws but stink in appearance. Black has admitted as much.
And let's not forget a 2002 leftover. Former Agriculture Commissioner, now inmate, Meg Scott Phipps accepted illegal campaign contributions to pay off her $1 million campaign debt. She took the money from companies who wanted the State Fair amusement contract.
The common theme in these stories is the always growing grab for more campaign money. Bob Hall of Democracy North Carolina, the campaign watchdog nonprofit in Carrboro, has documented the money growth.
A state House seat in 2002 on average cost the winner about $61,000; a Senate seat, $198,000. Candidates in a handful of contested races spent over $300,000.
Compare that with former U.S. Senator Robert Morgan's recollection in 2001: “When I was in law school in 1950, I ran for clerk of superior court in my county, and I had no contributions whatsoever. I paid for little hand cards myself and I bought my own gas. Later on, I ran for the state Senate, five times. My district included a huge area, from Sampson County in the eastern part of the state all the way to High Point. It was 150 miles from one side to the other. And in all that time, I only had one tank of gas and one $10 bill given to me.”
We have adopted several campaign reforms over the years, the most recent being the 2002 McCain-Feingold Act at the federal level and this year's Lobby Reform Act at the state level. Yet, the money culture advances.
To control it, I have seen two things work:
One, disclosure. If we can't get big money out of politics, at least keep track of it. Require open records for all players, including 527 political non-profits.
Two, voter-owned elections. North Carolina approved a nationally acclaimed system of public financing for appellate judicial campaigns. It passed its first test in 2004.
Edwin G. Wilson, Jr., chair of the N.C. Center for Voter Education and a Superior Court judge in Rockingham, offers this hope: “I think every day voters look in the paper and see the corrupting influence of money in politics, and they get angry and want to make a change. I hope that they're angry enough to look at candidates who are talking about campaign reform. I'm hopeful that we're reaching a tipping point where the public says, 'Enough!'”
Until then, follow the money.
Raleigh author Barlow Herget writes the “Follow the Money” column for the N.C. Center for Voter Education.
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