Global Breaking News - Monday, December 23, 2024

Why Limit Political Donations?
This week, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in McCutcheon v. the Federal Election Commission, a case that challenges limits on individual contributions made directly to political candidates. It would expand on the 2010 Citizens United ruling that allows unlimited spending by corporations. Instead of this piecemeal approach, would it make more sense to just get rid of all limits on political spending, as Senator Mitch McConnell has suggested?
* be scheduled to ~ = ~할 예정이다/ contribution = 기부금, 성금; 기여, 이바지/ expand on ~ = ~에 대해 부연하다(더 상세히 말하다)/ piecemeal = 조금씩 하는(되는), 단편적인/ strike down = 폐지하다/ interest group = 이익 단체

 개인(혹은 기업)의 정치인(정당)에 기부금에 제한이 있어야 하나요, 아니면 폐지해야 하나요?

1. Strike Down All Contribution Limits
In a free society, people should be able to give whatever they want to whomever they choose, including candidates for public office.

2. Senator McConnell v. the Founders
Our system of campaign finance "distorts and destroys the intended dependence the framers gave us" by calling on a "tiny slice of America" to raise campaign funds.

3. Limits to Candidates Deter Corruption
The closer the money comes to the hands of members of Congress, the greater the danger of corruption and undue influence of big donors.

4. Interest Groups Will Spend to Influence Politicians
History shows that doing away with aggregate and individual contribution limits to candidates opens the door to embarrassing quid pro quo corruption.


Sample Essay

Interest Groups Will Spend to Influence Politicians

What do campaign contribution limits have to do with the price of milk? Plenty.

The contribution limits at issue in the McCutcheon case are reforms inspired by Watergate's corruption. Here, I gave the example of the policy changes McDonald’s extracted from the Nixon administration (including higher prices for burgers) after a quarter million dollar donation. But McDonald’s wasn’t the only one that wanted, and got, a sweetheart deal from the Nixon administration.

In 1971, the Associated Milk Producers Inc. sought $100 million in milk subsidies — a tab paid by the U.S. taxpayer — in exchange for $2 million in contributions to Nixon’s reelection campaign. The magnitude of this donation from the milkmen would have raised eyebrows, so it was broken up and routed through hundreds of PACs to obscure its true source. After sealing the deal, John Ehrlichman, Nixon’s counsel, laughed and said, “we better go get ourselves a glass of milk. Drink it while it’s still cheap.”

The milk bribes came up during the Supreme Court oral argument in Buckley v. Valeo, the case in which the post-Watergate reforms, including contribution limits were first ruled constitutional.

If the Supreme Court overturns Buckley — a case reaffirmed on multiple occasions in the past decades — it would be an astonishingly bold and poor decision. To do away with aggregate and individual contribution limits to candidates would open the door to embarrassing quid pro quo corruption. Interest groups already chomp at the bit to influence lawmakers through their lobbyists. With limits gone, there would be an enormous impetus to divert money from paying lobbyists to filling the campaign coffers of office holders and to spend in big enough sums to turn a politician’s head. Polling indicates few Americans would want that. Let’s hope five justices also want to avoid that grim fate.