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Federal financing has not reduced the cost of Presidential contests.
If reducing the expenditures in Congressional and Presidential campaigns is a serious objective, there are two things that can be done that will be effective and not violate the Constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech or of political assembly.
First, on the money supply side, corporate and labor union PACs, as now constituted, with the corporations permitted to use corporate funds (which might otherwise go to stock holders, employees, or indirectly to customers by way of lower prices) to organize and conduct PACs, and with the labor unions allowed to use money, from union dues for the same purpose, should be allowed. ,f,
Second on the demand, or expenditure side, political advertisements, now a major expenditure in campaigns, should be outlawed on grounds that they corrupt citizens in the exercise of the highest responsibility of citizenship.
Finally, the whole Federal Election Act as amended in 1975 should be repealed and the traditional patterns of political action restored. The American Revolution was not fought with matching funds from George III, nor was there any limitation set on the financial contributions made to that political cause by Washington, Hancock, Lafayette, or others.
Had John Gardner of Common Cause been present, kibitzing about Independence Hall while Thomas Jefferson wrote the stirring words of the Declaration of Independence, pledging for the patriots their “Lives, Honor, and Fortunes,” he might well have proposed a change in the text to have it read “We pledge our Lives, our Honor, and up to one thousand dollars. ”
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