Free air time—the next step in campaign finance reform

National Voter, Jan-Feb, 2003 by Paul (American choreographer) Taylor

A few generations ago, Will Rogers said that "it costs so much to run for office, you can't even afford to lose."

His quip rings even more true today--and nothing in the campaign finance reform bill that Congress passed last year will make it any less true tomorrow. The new law is designed to limit the supply of political money. But it will do nothing to restrain the demand.

So the price of admission to elective office keeps rising at a breakneck pace. It cost about $1 million to win a typical seat in the U.S. House of Representatives last year.

The most promising place to find relief from the soaring demand for political money is at the biggest source of the problem--broadcast television.

Money on that scale warps our democracy in two ways. One is by purchasing influence. The other, as Will Rogers knew, is by stifling competition.

Television stations took in an estimated $1 billion from the sale of political spots in 2002, even as they scaled way back on issue-based political coverage. Come election season, they auction off the right to "free speech" to the highest bidder. And they do so using publicly owned airwaves they have been given the right to use for free, in return for a pledge to serve the public interest.

At the end of last year, Sens. John McCain [RAZ], Russell Feingold [DWI] and Richard Durbin [D-WL] introduced a new bill that would hold them to that pledge. It would require all television and radio stations to air at least two hours a week of candidate debates, interviews, town hall meetings, etc. in the month before elections. And it would provide vouchers to qualifying candidates and parties to run a limited number of free ads.

The Senators will reintroduce the legislation at the beginning of the 108th session of Congress. With the help of the League of Women Voters and more than 50 other national groups, we hope to make this bill the next major front in the never-ending effort to create a democracy in which political campaigns can be driven by ideas, not money.

VOTER LINKS

* www.freeairtime.org