KINDER'S COMMENTARY: CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FLAWS

I belong to a privileged class of Americans. I am an incumbent officeholder.

Last year, we in the Missouri General Assembly debated and passed, over my strenuous opposition, Senate Bill 650, which, in the Orwellian manner of Big Governments everywhere, is misleadingly called a "campaign finance reform bill."

Let me tell you what happens when a bunch of incumbent politicians pass "campaign finance reform" legislation. It is, unsurprisingly, this: They write laws to protect incumbents and insulate themselves from real competition in a race where voters will actually get to hear a debate and have a choice.

Senate Bill 650 is a bunch of incumbent protection garbage. I said so during floor debate and predicted that it wouldn't survive a court challenge on constitutional grounds.

Then late last year, Missouri voters passed Proposition A, a stringent initiative that screwed down limits on campaign donations even tighter than did SB 650. As predicted, bipartisan groups of litigants sued, challenging various of these measures. On Tuesday, the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down nearly all of the voter-passed Prop A provisions and some of those contained in SB 650, declaring them unconstitutional, as a few of us had predicted would happen all along. The Eighth Circuit is the level of appellate court just below the U.S. Supreme Court.

The upshot is this: No provision of either SB 650 or Prop A that has come under constitutional attack in two different lawsuits has survived scrutiny by the courts. What a mess is this business of "campaign finance reform" legislation!

To give you an example of how bad the incumbent protection in SB 650 is, let's discuss one measure that survives yet today, because to date no litigant has challenged it. One section of the law bars fund raising by any candidate while the Legislature is in session.

Think about that: Not only are incumbent lawmakers barred, while in session, from seeking the funds they need to finance a campaign, but so are challengers -- ordinary citizens who not only don't currently hold office, but may never have held public office! These are the folks who, lacking the numerous, built-in advantages of incumbency, need to start earlier and work harder -- in a year-long effort or even longer, in some cases -- to raise whatever funds they can get their hands on to make themselves known and communicate their message.

This is perhaps the most blatantly unconstitutional and biggest incumbent protection device of all. We're in session in Jefferson City from Jan. 3 to the middle of May. During this period, nearly half the year, citizens who aspire to win a seat in either the House or Senate are flatly barred from doing what all but independently wealthy candidates must do: Solicit funds to become viable candidates capable of communicating a message.

This provision helps lock in incumbents. Like me. Because it serves to severely limit the field of potential challengers and to discourage competitive election campaigns, it is an absolute disgrace.

Although this disgraceful law helps me as a member of the protected class of incumbents, it isn't good for our election campaigns or our democracy to have our public debate and our discussion of issues so severely curtailed. I am for competitive elections and for the vigorous debate and open discussion of issues characteristic of real campaigns. Cloaked in lots of pious jabbering about how "we're cleaning up election campaigns," SB 650 was designed to insulate folks like me from such rigors. I will always be proud that I argued and voted against SB 650 and pleaded with my colleagues to do likewise.

And now, the next court challenge should be one aimed at SB 650's bar on fund raising while the legislature is in session. A well-aimed torpedo can and should sink the whole ship, with all aboard.

~Peter Kinder is the associate publisher of the Southeast Missourian and a state senator from Cape Girardeau.