Campaign Finance Reform Research Paper

Each year billions of dollars are spent on getting candidates of various offices of government elected. Many candidates have had tremendous success through the efforts of much needed monetary contributions to their campaign. Contributors range from unions, religious leaders, organizations such as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers (MADD), the National Rifle Association (NRA), and senior citizens groups. When these groups, known as special interest groups, donate to candidate’s campaign, they expect the candidate to respond to their issues. Because special interest groups, as well as private citizens donate more and more money to campaigns, there is some concern that there is a great need for campaign finance reform.

From the very first elections held in the United States, there has always been a strong link between money and politics. During the first elections in the late 1700’s you had to be a white male landowner over the age of 21 in order to vote, meaning that you had to have money in order to have your vote counted. It seems today that we cannot go a day with out seeing campaign finance in the media, whether or not it is through advertisements for politicians in the media or asked to donate money to help let your favorite candidate win. Because campaign finance has always been on the back burner of political issues, there has hardly been any change to the large influence money has over the election process and politicians. While money has it’s

Campaign Finance reform has been a topic of interest throughout the history of the United States Government, especially in the more recent decades. There are arguments on both sides of the issue. Proponents of campaign finance limits argue that wealthy donors and corporations hold too much power in elections and as a result they can corrupt campaigns. Those who favor less regulation argue that campaign donations are a form of free speech. One case in particular, Citizens United vs. The Federal Election Commission has altered everything with pertaining to Campaign Finance.

Regulating soft money has been difficult because of constitutional issues that protect First Amendment rights, and Congress’ rights over regulating political parties must be focused on preventing fraud or corruption (Mason, 1997). Soft money is used to mobilize campaigns by using the money to support voter registration drives, and other similar activities designed to jump start a candidates’ campaign (Brennan Center, 2000). For this reason, soft money is important to an election campaign, and recently the amount of soft money raised for campaigns has skyrocketed. It has become a concern because it is largely unregulated and can be used to gain an unfair

Elissa Nunez of NBC News reports that 64% of Americans believe that the big money in politics discourages many great candidates from running (Nunez). On top of this number, 76% of people believe that "money has a greater influence on politics and elected officials today than in the past," (Nunez). These numbers lead to a fundamental issue in our government; a huge distrust in our federal government. Only a month after 9/11, 60% of citizens said they could trust the federal government, however, following the Iraq war and an economic downturn the number dropped to a mere 24% in 2007

The right of free speech granted to all citizens in the first amendment, the necessity of funding expensive political campaigns, and the fact that small donations make a candidate responsive to the needs of their constituents, all make any restrictions on campaign financing unneeded and onerous. Congress should strike down any bills attempting to reform this essential part of the U.S. election process. Any further restrictions on donations to political campaigns will prove detrimental to the United States functioning system of elections by limiting individuals’ freedom of speech, making our candidate’s campaigns underfunded and unresponsive to the needs of the American people.

Despite its popularity, there is no serious evidence that campaign finance regulation has actually accomplished any of the goals set out for it by its supporters. Efforts to regulate campaign finance have been little short of disastrous. They have distorted the political process, hindered grassroots political involvement, infringed on First Amendment rights, and helped to entrench incumbents in office while doing nothing to address the allegedly corrupting influence of money in politics.

Daniel R. Ortiz’s writing, The Democratic Paradox of Campaign Finance Reform states that those who argue for campaign finance reform, violate the democratic theory in the name of defending it. This article reveals the paradox between campaign finance reform and other types of regulation of political process. Although the paradox is unavoidable, along with discomforting, it should be made evident.

So we don’t always know how much money a candidate is really receiving. Gabrielle rejects Kupfer’s theory that democracy is still not corrupt and the proof shows in the 2016 election. Kupfer found that Hilary Clinton had spent more money than Trump in the election, but what about the dark money that wasn’t public? If the money doesn’t have to be reported than Americans don’t know exactly how much a candidate is receiving or what this money is being spent on. Therefore, we don’t really know how much money is really contributed to the

The current network of campaign finance is a complicated web involving individual contributors, soft money and hard money, and political action committee influence. In the aftermath of the crooked Watergate scandal, anxiety over campaign finance led to the passage of two major reform bills—the Revenue Act of 1971 and the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974—that have set the guidelines and regulations for campaign finance. Although many other laws and acts have been passed in effort to regulate campaign finance, these two acts set the main standards for campaign finance regulation. The main ideas of the acts stipulate that candidates for the two houses of Congress receive no public funding, candidates in the presidential primaries receive matching dollars, and candidates

There were several landmark supreme court cases and laws before Citizens United that attempted to regulate campaign contributions. Political corruption can easily be caused by increased amounts of funds going to a candidate. A candidate will be more likely to benefit corporate interests because that will allow them to get more money later to help in reelection efforts. This becomes problematic because average citizens do not have the ability to donate large sums of money to a candidate. This makes the speech of large corporations worth far more than the average citizen. This can have a drastic impact on the marketplace of ideas. John Stuart Mills in his book, On Liberty, creates the marketplace of ideas. This marketplace consists of all speech being able to have equal weight and face

With the introduction of “soft” money in politics, elections no longer go to the best candidate, but simply to the richer one. Soft money is defined as unregulated money that is given to the political parties that ends up being used by candidates in an election. In last year’s elections, the Republican and Democratic parties raised more than one-half of a billion dollars in soft money. Current politicians are pushing the envelope farther than any previous administrations when it comes to finding loopholes in the legal system for campaign fundraising. The legal limit that any one person can contribute to a given candidate or campaign is one thousand dollars. There is, however, no limit on the amount of money one

With the upcoming presidential election, it has been interesting to learn about things as they are actually happening in our country today. Among the many issues that surround the race to the office, financing the presidential election seems to be a major topic that is always in the public eye.      There are many different views on how the election should be financed but it is hard to tell how far government funding and donations can go before democracy is left behind.

In his discussion of campaign finance regulation, Christiano argues that with cases of gatekeeper mechanism and opinion formation mechanism, campaign expenditures should be regulated to prevent “drowning out” of the opinions of nonaffluents. He proposes that certain regulations will actually help protect and promote freedom of expression, and suggests to limit expenditures and distribute vouchers during campaign periods. Using a prima facie equation, I will argue against the claim that Christiano’s restrictions interfere unduly with freedom of expression and defend his proposal as a valid resolution to the problem of “drowning out.”

The idea of money in politics has always been a polarizing issue. For over one hundred years the discussion of individuals and corporations financing campaigns has led to a debate of corruption versus free speech. Is money in politics a corrupting influence that always leads to quid pro quo? Or, is it an issue of allowing individuals to use their money as an extension of their freedom of speech? Recently, campaign finance reform has been a very dynamic issue. With the last major supreme court case Citizens United v. FEC, money in politics has taken a significant turn from the status quo. With only seven years after the Citizens United ruling we can already see the effects of less regulated free speech in politics.