Campaign finance reform changes political game

The McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Bill passed Wednesday night by the U.S. Senate may not be perfect bill, but given the less than perfect situation with which it deals, it may be the best hope political reformers will get. As significant as the measure itself was, the way in which it passed -- by a bipartisan coalition that rebuffed both the House leadership and Republican leaders in the Senate-- demonstrated to the American public Congress' seriousness in fighting the corrupting influence of money in national politics.
Because the Republican Party has traditionally been able to raise millions of dollars more in soft money -- the kind that doesn't have to be reported -- GOP leaders have worked assiduously to keep the corrupting system in place, despite growing public opposition.
Last July, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. with the help of Majority Whip Tom DeLay and House Majority Leader Dick Armey, both Texas Republicans, refused to let the campaign finance reform bill come to a vote. But by this year, the political winds, in some regard a result of Enron's collapse, had changed, and the representatives passed the measure -- the H.R. 2356 Shays-Meehan Bill -- 240-189. The Senate version incorporated all the amendments to the House's Shays-Meehan so that once the Senate passed the bill -- as it did 60-40 -- it could go directly to the president's desk, bypassing a joint conference committee which could have delayed the new law even further,
President George W. Bush recognizes that the bill isn't perfect but has said he will sign it because it does improve the system overall.
It has only taken seven years to reach this point.
New battle: But the diehards, led by Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., have hired former Whitewater special prosecutor Ken Starr to battle the bill in the courts. McConnell describes the impending legal combat as "a mission to preserve the fundamental constitutional freedom of all Americans to fully participate in our democracy. & quot; What McConnell really means is that all wealthy American can fully participate in our democracy.
Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., who sponsored the campaign finance bill in the Senate with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said he has Attorney General John Ashcroft's assurance that the Justice Department would defend the statute's constitutionality.
For a Republican administration to be fighting Republicans in court is quite a turn-around. But the president is on the side of public opinion although it does put him in strange company. Those who lobbyied for passage of campaign finance reform measures include the Sierra Club, Common Cause and the League of Women Voters. Opposing reform are the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Rifle Association, the Christian Coalition, the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees and National Right to Life.
The ideal remains total, fast and accurate reporting of all donations and expenditures. But until that happens, the new bill is the best we can do.