|
Nov 9, 2006 -- Legal Center Weekly Report: November 9, 2006
Contrary to conventional wisdom, Tuesday's Election Day results showed that American voters reached a breaking point in their tolerance of congressional corruption. The scandals, investigations, indictments, resignations and plea agreements just kept coming in a steady stream, and congressional approval ratings continued to sink.
As a result, the new Congress will have a very different look. Rampant corruption — especially the pay-to-play system in Washington — undermined Americans' faith in their elected officials and once again inspired a swift and decisive voter backlash. The House Democratic leadership has put forth a good starting point for reform, and House Speaker-designate Nancy Pelosi deserves credit for making ethics and lobby reform a top priority for the 110th Congress. We will stand firmly behind an effort toward real and realistic reform.
To read the full statement by the Campaign Legal Center Policy Director Meredith McGehee, click here.
On November 9, 2006 reform groups held a press conference to call for immediate action by the new congress on lobbying and ethics reforms while stressing the need for an independent ethics enforcement entity. These groups include the Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, Democracy 21, League of Women Voters, Public Citizen and U.S. PIRG.
The groups commend House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi for her legislation in this Congress, the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act (H.R. 4682), which contains a number of important and valuable ethics and lobbying reform provisions. They also called on the new Senate Majority Leader to make a similar public commitment for the Senate to act quickly to pass effective ethics and lobbying reforms.
The groups also made three points about the reform effort pledged in the House, which also apply to the efforts that must be undertaken in the Senate:
First, an independent ethics enforcement entity must be created to help enforce the congressional ethics rules. Second, they urged any proposed new ethics rules be carefully reviewed to ensure that there are no loopholes in the rules. Third, if, as expected, the House acts only on new ethics rules on the first day of the new Congress, that House leadership make clear publicly the other reforms contained in the Pelosi bill requiring legislation will be acted on quickly.
To read the full statement by the reform groups, click here .
Legal Center Files Supreme Court Brief in Washington v. WEA
The Legal Center this week filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in the consolidated cases Washington v. Wash. Education Assoc. (WEA) and Davenport v. WEA—supporting the state's defense of a labor union "opt-in" campaign finance statute.
The State of Washington passed a law requiring labor unions to obtain affirmative authorization from nonmembers, before using such nonmembers' agency shop fees (i.e., fees nonmembers are required to pay to cover the costs of collective bargaining) to make political contributions and expenditures. A state labor union, the Washington Education Association, challenged the statute on federal constitutional grounds—acknowledging that nonmembers have a constitutional right to "opt-out" of having their funds used for political purposes by requesting a refund, but arguing that the state violated the union's rights by taking the protection of nonmembers one step further and allowing unions to use nonmembers' funds for political purposes only if the nonmembers' "opt-in" by affirmatively authorizing such usage.
The Legal Center's amicus brief makes clear that federal law has long imposed an "opt-in" requirement on labor union and corporation political activity—and that the U.S. Supreme Court has consistently upheld the federal law "opt-in" requirement as constitutional, most recently in McConnell v. FEC.
To view the amicus brief, click here .
On Monday, November 6, 2006, the United States Supreme Court dismissed as moot an appeal by the Christian Civic League of Maine (CCLM) in its challenge to a portion of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA). In May 2006, a three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia denied CCLM's request for a preliminary injunction in its challenge to the "electioneering communications" clause of BCRA.
BCRA's electioneering communications provisions prohibit the use of corporate general treasury funds to pay for broadcast advertisements within 30 days of a primary election and 60 days of a general election if the ad references a federal candidate. The focus of this case was an ad (known as "the Crossroads ad") that CCLM claimed it wanted to run using its corporate general treasury funds and referencing by name both of Maine's senators within 30 days of the state's primary election. At the time, Senator Olympia Snowe was a candidate in that primary. In denying the requested injunction, the three-judge district court emphasized that the CCLM plaintiffs could run their broadcast ad using PAC funds or use general treasury funds if they simply removed the specific reference to Senator Snowe. CCLM appealed the denial of that injunction and that appeal was dismissed as moot by the Supreme Court this week.
Meanwhile, at the time CCLM's appeal was pending, the case proceeded in the district court. CCLM claimed that while it had no plans to run the particular ad in the future, it wanted to run materially similar ads at a later date. On September 27, 2006, the three-judge court granted dispositive motions by the defendants for judgment on the pleadings and to dismiss with regard to CCLM's claim that it wanted to run unspecified ads in the future that CCLM claimed were similar to the ad they proposed to broadcast in May 2006. With regard to the Crossroads ad, the three-judge court ruled that the case was moot. CCLM has filed a Notice of Appeal from that dismissal and has filed a Jurisdictional Statement in the United States Supreme Court. That appeal remains pending.
The Legal Center is serving as counsel in the case for defendant intervenors Senators McCain and Feingold, along with Reps. Shays, Meehan, and Allen. Serving as co-counsel with the Legal Center are Democracy 21, University of Virginia law professor Dan Ortiz, and attorneys at the law firms of: Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr; Heller Ehrman; and Munger Tolles and Olson.
Legal Center Blog Highlights
Each week, the Legal Center staff posts blog entries on its site, www.clcblog.org. Click to read this week's entries: "The November 2006 Elections: What Do The Data Show?," "Newsflash: Voters Fed Up With Congressional Corruption," "CLC Files Supreme Court Brief in Labor Union Campaign Finance Cases," "And Now a Word From Our Candidates and Their Detractors," o r to sign up for blog updates, click here.
To read a variety of this week's editorials and articles on campaign finance, please click here. |
