[EL] NYC system a model?

Fri Mar 9 09:50:46 PST 2012

It is, at best, debatable whether tax financed elections lead to more competition in any meaningful sense. But either way New York City's system, the particular item of discussion today, is a particularly poor example for that contention, which may be why it doesn't even rate a mention in that section of the Brennan Center report Mark cites.

Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault

   Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 E. Broad St.

Columbus, OH 43215

614.236.6317

http://law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.aspx

________________________________
From: Mark Schmitt [schmitt.mark at gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, March 09, 2012 11:36 AM
To: Smith, Brad
Subject: Re: [EL] NYC system a model?

There are a number of other stated benefits of publicly financed campaigns, such as increasing competition, which they have been shown to achieve. Competition in turn helps voters to remove elected officials who they consider corrupt, or inept, without waiting for a prosecutor to amass enough evidence.  See this report from Brennan: http://www.brennancenter.org/content/resource/more_than_combating_corruption_the_other_benefits_of_public_financing/

And if the argument is about overall corruption in public-financing jurisdictions, you need not only a real measure of the total level of corruption (more than just "case studies") but also a baseline for the level of corruption in that jurisdiction pre-public financing. Most of the systems were enacted in response to major state- or city-wide scandals in which lots of people went to jail: Gov. Rowland in CT, the late-Koch administration scandals in NYC, and the procession of massive scandals in Arizona in the 1990s, from Meachm and AZ-scam through Fife Symington's conviction, that took down two governors and dozens of legislators. So all the systems are starting from a pretty high baseline level of corruption.

And then, in trying to measure the amount of corruption, you need to make sure you're not just seeing more of it because there's better enforcement. But there is tighter enforcement in public financing systems, so more petty corruption is likely to get caught.

/Mark

On 3/9/2012 8:17 AM, Smith, Brad wrote:

Mark's criteria strikes me as rather rigged criteria for measuring success. Tax financed elections are supposed to reduce corruption. But when there remain numerous episodes of corruption, we're told we can't count that as a failure of tax financing unless the corruption specifically involves violation of the tax financing system rules.

Applying that logic to traditional systems of voluntary financing, we would only find corruption when someone specifically broke the rules regulating the campaign finance system - making corruption rare, indeed.

What we prefer to look for is evidence that tax financed systems acheive their stated goals, and typically stated as a primary goal is limiting corruption. The record is very weak. There are probably few governing bodies in the country more plagued by corruption than the NYC Council. Unless having a tax financed system is in and of itself the goal, regardless of whether it leads to better government, it's hard to see why New York's system would be a model anyone would want to import.

Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault

   Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 E. Broad St.

Columbus, OH 43215

614.236.6317

http://law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.aspx

________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> [law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu>] on behalf of Mark Schmitt [schmitt.mark at gmail.com<mailto:schmitt.mark at gmail.com>]
Sent: Friday, March 09, 2012 12:15 AM
To: law-election at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election at department-lists.uci.edu>
Subject: Re: [EL] NYC system a model?

For all the "multitudes," Liu seems to be the only case that's mainly about fraud or corruption in the public financing system itself. The others are perhaps waste (use of campaign funds, from both public and private sources, after the election), or corrupt pols like Larry Seabrook who had been stealing money from every pot available (mainly putting council money through nonprofits he controlled, which is the classic NYC model) for three decades, and who also happened to participate in the public funding system. Seabrook, Pedro Espada, etc were crooks long before there was public financing.

The Center for Competitive Politics "case studies" of Arizona, NY and Maine are mostly similar -- How is the Fiesta Bowl scandal a public-financing scandal? A bunch of politicians received reimbursed contributions that were illegal under state and federal law. The recipients included state officials who participated in the system, some who hadn't, and some who were federal electeds who weren't even eligible.

Most of these incidents, especially those in New York, were caught and prosecuted because good public financing systems have, or should have, really capable, tough enforcement agencies. The New York City Campaign Finance Board has won all kinds of awards from the Council on Government Ethics Laws, and candidates consider the board merciless. If the FEC were one-third as independent and competent as the NYC CFB, we'd probably see a lot more identifiable corruption in federal politics, because they'd be acting on many more complaints.

The alternative hypothesis that better fits the NYC and other "case studies" would be that, in states and cities that have public financing, there's more public support for strong and independent enforcement agencies, because they are safeguarding public dollars. And therefore, much more misuse of funds and corruption is caught and known.

/Mark Schmitt

(I think this is my first post to this list, but I'm a longtime reader, and sometimes write on campaign finance at TNR and elsewhere.)

Mark Schmitt
Senior Fellow, The Roosevelt Institute<http://www.rooseveltinstitute.org/>
202/246-2350
gchat or Skype: schmitt.mark
twitter: mschmitt9

On 3/8/2012 12:57 PM, Bill Maurer wrote:
Good point.  I guess like Walt Whitman, the NYC model for corruption, fraud, waste and abuse is large.  It contains multitudes.  They can’t all fit in 650 words.

From: Smith, Brad [mailto:BSmith at law.capital.edu]
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 9:54 AM
To: Bill Maurer; law-election at UCI.edu<mailto:law-election at UCI.edu>
Subject: RE: NYC system a model?

Hey, I'm sure they gave Allison 650 words or so. There are limits.

Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault

   Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 E. Broad St.

Columbus, OH 43215

614.236.6317<tel:614.236.6317>

http://law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.aspx

________________________________
From: Bill Maurer [wmaurer at ij.org<mailto:wmaurer at ij.org>]
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 12:44 PM
To: Smith, Brad; law-election at UCI.edu<mailto:law-election at UCI.edu>
Subject: RE: NYC system a model?
Brad,

You’re selling the New York system short.  It has so many more avenues for waste and abuse than just those.

http://www.makenolaw.org/blog/8-government/187-fighting-corruption-by-getting-the-taxpayer-to-pay-your-parking-tickets

Bill

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu]<mailto:[mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu]> On Behalf Of Smith, Brad
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 8:05 AM
To: law-election at UCI.edu<mailto:law-election at UCI.edu>
Subject: Re: [EL] NYC system a model?

Ironic that the CFI report should coincide with recent news about more corruption in New York City's tax financed system for campaigns. See http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/unclean_elections_xC5dUPJXIhx5tStDvjARnN#ixzz1oUzlTHh4.

"The arrest of Hou — accused of using straw donors to trigger more matching funds from taxpayers — is merely the latest shoe to drop.

Yet Liu is far from unique. The numerous abuses include everything from City Council candidates collecting public funds for “races” that weren’t seriously contested, to labor unions being accused of illegally coordinating efforts with candidates."

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/unclean_elections_xC5dUPJXIhx5tStDvjARnN#ixzz1oXeyAINm

Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault

   Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 E. Broad St.

Columbus, OH 43215

614.236.6317<tel:614.236.6317>

http://law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.aspx

________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> [law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu>] on behalf of Rick Hasen [rhasen at law.uci.edu<mailto:rhasen at law.uci.edu>]
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2012 11:00 AM
To: law-election at UCI.edu<mailto:law-election at UCI.edu>
Subject: [EL] ELB News and Commentary 3/8/12

“‘Small Donors, Big Democracy: New York City’s Matching Funds as a Model for the Nation and States’ published in Election Law Journal”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=31225>
Posted on March 8, 2012 7:53 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=31225> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

See this press release<http://www.cfinst.org/Press/PReleases/12-03-08/%E2%80%9CSmall_Donors_Big_Democracy_New_York_City%E2%80%99s_Matching_Funds_as_a_Model_for_the_Nation_and_States%E2%80%9D_published_in_Election_Law_Journal.aspx>.
<http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D31225&title=%E2%80%9C%E2%80%98Small%20Donors%2C%20Big%20Democracy%3A%20New%20York%20City%E2%80%99s%20Matching%20Funds%20as%20a%20Model%20for%20the%20Nation%20and%20States%E2%80%99%20published%20in%20Election%2>
Posted in campaign finance<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10> | Comments Off

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