| The Reformers The 85-year-old League of Women Voters is a grassroots organization with more than 900 state and local chapters. The group takes an official position on about 40 issues and employs a lobbying army of . . . two. “We don’t give anybody any money; we don’t take anybody out to lunch; we don’t have a private airplane,” says Nancy Tate, the league’s executive director and a member of AU’s School of Public Affairs advisory council. “We’re just trying to have the views of the members expressed. One of the things that members of Congress respond particularly well to is their constituents. Because we have 900 local leagues that are in lots of people’s jurisdictions, it means something [to a Congressman] to get a letter.” The strategy sounds as if it was taken directly from Thurber’s blueprint. Because it plays by the rules and has an interest in democracy and issues, and not partisan politics, the league is leading the fight for reform in Congress. It has partnered with a number of other nonprofits in supporting an elimination of privately funded travel, a gift ban, the creation of an outside entity to enforce the rules, and an increase in disclosure and reporting. “Really this is all about money, and that’s been going on for a very long time,” Tate says. “People with money, special interests, are able to think of better ways to influence the process, and members of Congress are encouraging them. A lot of the members bear responsibility, people aren’t just coming up to them in a garage and slipping them an envelope. The main thing that certainly applies to the members of the House is that the purpose of these gifts is to help the incumbent get reelected. The challengers don’t have a chance.” The league wants to prohibit lobbyists from serving as officials on candidates’ campaign committees, in hopes of breaking incumbents’ strangleholds on offices. Of the 435 House races, only about 40 will be competitive come November, Tate said. “No matter who you want, it’s always weighted to the incumbent,” she says. “In that sense, your vote doesn’t count; you’re going to get the incumbent nine times out of 10.” If Fred Turner ’93 ’95, Rep. Alcee Hastings’s (D-Fla.) chief of staff, could snap his fingers and miraculously institute one change, he, too, would look to limit lobbyists’ ability to raise money for candidates. “If you had public financing of campaigns and you eliminated PACs, lobbyists’ power would be based on the strengths of their arguments and not the size of their checkbooks,” he says. “Of course, that’s the most controversial [proposal] and the least likely to happen.” Standing in the lobby of the Willard Intercontinental Hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue, where President Ulysses S. Grant supposedly coined the term “lobbying” more than a century ago, Thurber remains optimistic about the future of the profession he has grown to love. “I think reforms will go through, and there will be a little more transparency and a little more enforcement. It will not hurt the industry or profession for our students,” he says, marble pillars and the hustle and bustle of institutional Washington surrounding him. “It’s a growth industry, because there’s complexity in the world that requires expertise and advocacy.”
The Process
Lobbyists serve as a vital cog of the democratic engine, plugging away on behalf of varying segments of the American public. To see exactly how, simply pop the hood and peer in.
In the second half of 2003, AARP, formerly known as the American Association of Retired Persons, shelled out $16.38 million for lobbying, according to PoliticalMoneyLine.com. The overwhelming majority of those funds went to lend support to the controversial Medicare reform bill that President Bush ultimately signed into law. One point on which the bill’s proponents and detractors agree: without AARP’s effort, which included a television advertising campaign, the legislation probably would not have seen the light of day.
Whether the $400 billion bill was good public policy is neither here nor there when the question being considered is the effect of lobbying on its fate. With 35 million members and a bevy of seasoned lobbyists on Capitol Hill, AARP provided the political muscle needed to push the measure past the finish line.
Walk up to most anyone on the street and they’ll likely have an opinion on at least one hot button topic of the day. But how many actually act to ensure that their voice is heard?
Fred Turner ’93, ’95 is chief of staff for Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.). Each week Hastings’s office hears from more than 1,000 constituents, an impressive figure until you consider that Hastings represents more than 700,000 people in his district. Who then speaks for those who may be interested if not involved?
Enter lobbyists, who unite the power of similarly minded citizens, corporations, or foreign governments to influence those in power. It’s an industry that has been steadily growing for decades, but has undergone a dramatic explosion in the last five years. Since 2000, the number of registered lobbyists has more than doubled, to 34,785, and spending on federal lobbying has jumped 30 percent, reaching a reported $2.1 billion last year. That’s a substantial amount of cash, for sure, enough to pay each member of Congress about $470,000 per month.
Those numbers are staggering and make it easy to grasp the impact both ethical and unscrupulous lobbyists can have on policy in this country. The Abramoff scandal sparked outrage among the punditry and populace, and both Republicans and Democrats responded by offering up reform proposals designed to curb the influence lobbyists can have on politicians.
In late March, the Senate passed a bipartisan bill requiring lobbyists to provide more information on their dealings with legislators. But the measure was criticized by several watchdog groups who called it weak, and as American magazine went to press the House had yet to pass its own bill, leading some to wonder whether Congress is capable of fixing a system that in many ways benefits itself. |
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