Money Has Corrupted the American Political System



Money Has Corrupted the American Political System

Richard N. Goodwin

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Business corporations and wealthy individuals have successfully purchased influence and votes in America's government through their financial contributions to political officials and parties, argues Richard N. Goodwin in the following viewpoint. The enormous amount of dollars flowing into America's political system has corrupted it in favor of those who contribute the most, he contends. Goodwin, a former assistant to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, argues for strict limits on political giving and spending in order to remove the influence of "money power" on government.

As you read, consider the following questions:

1. What great object of the Constitution has been nullified by money, according to Goodwin?

2. What sorts of favors do political contributors expect, according to the author?

3. What historical precedent does Goodwin cite as comparable with America's present political situation?

The great object of the new Constitution, James Madison wrote, was "to secure the public good and private rights against the danger of ... faction." By "faction," Madison meant "a number of citizens ... actuated by some common interest ... adverse to the rights of other citizens or to the ... interests of the community."

In recent years those constitutional protections have broken down. Mammoth amounts of money have been poured into the political system by private interests which have thus purchased privilege, power and profit. It would not be an exaggeration to assert that the American government--president, executive branch and Congress--has been bought and sold. Madisonian "faction" is firmly in the saddle and rides the nation.

We talk about this as if it were an issue of "campaign finance reform," an obscure and somewhat technical subject. But that is not the issue at all. It is not about how politicians should be financed, but how America should be governed, not about how we elect officials, but how they rule the nation.

Money Power

The principal power in Washington is no longer the government or the people it represents. It is the money power. Under the deceptive cloak of campaign contributions, access and influence, votes and amendments are bought and sold. Money establishes priorities of action, holds down federal revenues, revises federal legislation, shifts income from the middle class to the very rich. Money restrains the enforcement of laws written to protect the country from the abuses of wealth--laws that mandate environmental protection, antitrust laws, laws to protect the consumer against fraud, laws that safeguard the securities market, and many more.

The grotesque amounts of money that are now pouring into the political system and the disgusting and demeaning way in which that money is raised are testimony to mounting corruption of politics and of government. Much of this wealth is legally given. But the fact that one can wriggle through the loopholes of badly drafted laws does not amount to a moral justification or to a denial of corruption.

It has become customary for our derelict public officials to recite the mantra, "There was no quid pro quo" given to the contributor of great wealth. It is not only an absurd response, it is a lie. Does anyone really think that hundreds of millions of dollars are being poured into political campaigns out of an excess of public-spirited zeal? The reality is simply common sense: Most of those who give this money are making an investment--a business investment. And the return on this investment is huge. They cannot "buy a guaranteed result," President Clinton casually informs us. And in most cases that may be so. But that is not what they are purchasing. They are investing in access and influence, in the right to persuade or coerce elected officials to their point of view or to enlist the officials' support in disputes with the agencies of government. And they usually get what they pay for: influence over elected officials who pass the laws or control the agencies, who can open up opportunities or foreclose them, and--most important--influence their earnings and profits.

For both sides to this scandalous transaction there is a bottom line. For the politician it is measured in votes. For the businessman the bottom line is profit and the protection of future earnings. No sensible businessman would deny himself so potentially profitable an investment, especially since experience demonstrates that you get what you pay for. And for both sides to the transaction there is also the reward of a nourished ego--the pride of being a high official cosseted by the titans of industry, or of being intimate with one of our guardians of democracy. It is a very comfortable arrangement in which everyone benefits except the people and the country.

We are amid corruption of a hitherto unknown scale but not without some precedent. In 1910, Bankers Magazine exulted that because of business financing of politics, "the legislatures and executive powers of the government are compelled to listen to the demands of organized business interests. That they are not entirely controlled by these interests is due to the fact that business organization has not yet reached its full perfection."

Take Money Out of Politics

In our time, perfection seems to have come a lot closer. But it may well be that the grotesque excesses of today will stimulate a serious reform. In the second decade of the 20th century, the Progressive movement responded to the conditions described by Bankers Magazine with protest, legislation and even a constitutional amendment requiring direct elections of the then totally corrupt Senate. The immediate issue is neither complicated nor difficult. But a little tinkering with "campaign finance laws," as is now proposed, will once again prove a travesty. We need to take the money out of politics before money takes the politics out of politics. The way to do this is through unavoidable and Draconian limits on giving and spending.

Can it be done? Of course.

Will it be done? Not by our present officials, those who owe their office and power to the very system we seek to abolish. It will require today, as it has in the past, public protest and unrelenting exposure, a kind of national league against corruption, outside the parties and determined to drive from office all those who oppose reducing the power of wealth over our democracy.

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