Voluntary public financing — a necessity if we are to remove the taint of private money from electoral politics — appears safe in the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, though I think reform advocates have a right to be concerned.
A close reading of this story in the Asbury Park Press indicates that there are few campaign finance experts in New Jersey who view the court’s ruling as being at odds with the state’s program. The primary “expert” tying the court decision back to the state’s clean-election program is Mike Schrimpf, a flack with the conservative Center for Competitive Politics (is there a greater example of false advertising?), an organization that opposes public financing.
“Rescue funds are primarily designed to level the playing field, and the court explicitly said that the Legislature cannot use the “leveling the playing field’ rationale as a reason to justify campaign-finance laws,” said Michael Schrimpf, a spokesman for the Center for Competitive Politics, which opposes using public funds for elections.
The experts — who come from both parties — take a different view:
Nick Nyhart, president of the Public Campaign Action Fund, said publicly funded elections have withstood court challenges in the past as courts have ruled government can place limits to curb actual or perceived corruption. What may differentiate New Jersey’s program is that the more onerous burden is placed on the candidate who volunteers for the program, not the self-funded one.
In the federal law — known as the millionaire’s amendment, which was inspired by now-Gov. Jon Corzine’s successful run for U.S. Senate in 2000 — the free spender has more reporting requirements while the opponent gets relaxed contribution limits.
“As a candidate, you don’t give anything up in order to get the relaxation of campaign contributions. It’s a pure gift,” Nyhart said. “For candidates who agree to public financing, they do agree to a spending limit and the amount of (rescue) funds are also limited, so certainly a candidate can outspend you.”
Two of New Jersey’s prominent partisan election lawyers agreed.
“If you sign into Clean Elections, you may be entitled to that money as part of a voluntary program — a little different than what’s going on at the federal level,” Republican lawyer Mark Sheridan said.
Another key difference, said Democratic lawyer Angelo Genova, is that New Jersey’s rescue money is awarded on a case-by-case basis with a ruling by the state Election Law Enforcement Commission, not a blanket formula, as the congressional law was written.
The decision does question “whether or not the ability of the publicly financed candidate to seek additional public financing imposes a burden on the self-financed candidate who doesn’t participate in the Clean Elections program,” Genova said. “I think reading this opinion, our program can withstand that scrutiny because it’s dealt with on a case-by- case, and not a formula, basis.”
Hank Kalet 