Small Donor Distortion

Submitted by Katie Schlieper on Tue, 04/10/2007 - 4:08pm.

This article, from David Weigel at Reason Magazine, claims the rise of the small-dollar donor eliminates the need for public financing. He trots out the beaten horse of Howard Dean's presidential campaign as proof that the internet provides an effective counterbalance to any iniquity inherent to privately financed elections. While the internet is a valuable tool for enhancing participation in politics, Weigel is kidding himself if he thinks it has corrected the imbalance big-money fundraising creates.

Pundits are fond of the trope that the internet is the answer to fundraising inequality in campaigns; but many fail to acknowledge the huge gap between the "donor class" (about one-quarter of one percent of the population) and the rest of us when it comes to the amount of money we have to give, no matter through what medium, to campaigns. It's not as if 98% of America has been wandering around with a wad full of cash; eager to contribute to a candidate but peevishly averse to using the US Postal Service.

The internet is a tool, a tool by which a larger group of people can become connected with campaigns. But having access to the internet doesn't make you wealthier, and it doesn't bestow upon you exclusive invitations to high-dollar fundraisers. It takes 96 $25 small-dollar contributors to equal one big-dollar contributor giving the maximum $2,400 contribution in the presidential primary. Is a presidential candidate (already spending half her day fundraising) going to make 96 individual thank you calls, and take 5 minutes to ask each what their concerns are? Or is she going to make one call to that $2,400 giver and take five minutes with him?

When your relative importance to a candidate -- and then to an elected official -- is to a certain degree determined by your wealth, the system is unequal, and needs a change.

By all means give your small contribution and lend that measure of support to your candidate -- the involvement of more people in the political process is the ultimate goal of all of our efforts-- but in no way do small dollar contributors receive equal treatment on the campaign trail, or in the Oval Office under the current system.

A privately financed campaign system makes some voters more valuable than others, favors the speech and concerns of a small group of people over those of the vast majority of our population. And the internet, no matter how magical, won't cancel that out. Certainly not as Clean Elections-style public financing can do and has done, where a voter's ability to give a particular sum of money is independent of their value to the campaign, and independent of the candidate's concern for their opinions.

Equating money with civic participation is a narrow and immensely conflicted view of our electoral process. Mr. Weigel would do well to take a larger view of what public financing could mean for broader, and idealogically richer, civic participation in this country.

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5 comments

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Thank you all for posting

Thank you all for posting your comments here -- it is great to see debate on this issue.

Submitted by blu ray ripper (not verified) on Mon, 01/25/2010 - 4:15am.

Anti allergic

Hey. Listen. Do not have an opinion while you listen because frankly, your opinion doesn?t hold much water outside of Your Universe. Just listen. Listen until their brain has been twisted like a dripping towel and what they have to say is all over the floor.
I am from Timor and too poorly know English, tell me right I wrote the following sentence: "Microbial, anti allergic and well being promoting properties of natural rooibos anti allergic."

Thanks for the help :-D, Hilton.

Submitted by Hilton (not verified) on Sun, 05/31/2009 - 6:09pm.

Would public financing increase participation

“Mr. Weigel would do well to take a larger view of what public financing could mean for broader, and idealogically richer, civic participation in this country.“

I am not clear how public financing would lear to a "broader, and ideologically richer, civic participation". If anything, if all campaigns were 100% publicly funded, I think it would stifle civic participation by disallowing me the opportunity to support the candidate of my choice, in favor of supporting every candidate financially, regardless of his/her appeal to me. In short, because I don't have the time at this point in my life to physically stump for a particular candidate, I would have less incentive to participate in the political process than I do now. Because I tend to vote for independents and small-party candidates who do not show up on the political radar of the two major parties and who would thus stand little chance of significant public financing, it would actually serve to stifle my civic participation and commitment to the system.

One could argue that I should participate directly in the civic process without money, but my $25 contribution is a much more efficient way of contributing than going out and volunteering my limited time: any campaign would ignore my efforts because I could donate less time than it would take them to train me. The arguments for public financing could even be taken to an absurd extreme to demand that the government provide neutral persons who would serve as activists so that candidates would not be beholden to any real activists who have donated more time than others. There will always be inequality of some sort in this process, but that is not a bad thing, as someone with good ideas deserves to be better rewarded than a loonbat.

My response will no doubt be dismissed as a free market-response that fails to see the corrupting influence of money, but just because the government doles out the money doesn't change that corruption. All it does is remove any sense that the candidate has anything that she/he owes me or anyone, except for the government that funded the campaign (somehow I doubt that they would feel more compelled to listen to me because their funding came from "the American people". In other words, the same sense of beholdeness that is decried would still apply, but we would get candidates that were in favor of more government because their patronage comes from the government rather than from individuals.

Submitted by Fenevad (not verified) on Wed, 04/11/2007 - 8:35am.

Accountability

Actually, public financing in the Clean Elections model requires candidates who wish to receive public funds (the program is voluntary) to collect small-dollar qualifying contributions from supporters (usually $5; though sometimes more); so if you want to financially support a candidate you're given the opportunity to do so. As to your question about promoting accountability, it comes in the form of your vote, not your money. A legislator seeking re-election as a Clean Elections candidate has to collect those qualifying contributions, and has to talk to a lot of voters to do it. If voters aren't happy with his or her job performance, they'll withhold their support. When mounting a viable campaign is dependent on securing public support -- not just financial backing -- it promotes accountability to voters. As a voter, I'm certainly more likely to engage in the electoral and political process if I feel my representatives are accountable to me, and that my participation has a tangible effect.

Submitted by Katie Schlieper on Wed, 04/11/2007 - 12:54pm.

Thank you

Thank you for the clarification. I obviously need to find out more, because it sounds like this is a much better program than the sort of public financing that would allow Lyndon Larouce to have access to the public trough...

Submitted by Fenevad (not verified) on Thu, 04/12/2007 - 8:29am.

Small Donor Distortion

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