Local reps. don’t agree on Clean Elections
Published on May 9th, 2001
STONEHAM, MA - A battle over the future of democracy in Massachusetts is raging, and Stoneham’s State Representatives are on different sides.
In November of 1998 voters approved Clean Elections, a ballot initiative calling for publicly funded state elections. The State Legislature then set aside $10 million a year in fiscal 2000 and 2001 to fund the program.
But on May 1, 2001, the House voted 96-59 to amend the funding model. Instead of state money going into a dedicated account, individuals will have the option to check a box on their income tax returns and make voluntary contributions.
The Clean Elections Law allows candidates for state offices to receive public financing for primary and general elections. Candidates must raise a threshold amount of private money to qualify and are then subject to strict limits in spending.
After the initiative passed in the fall of 1998, the Legislature voted to study it and work out any kinks before the law’s effective date of March 31, 2001. The only vote taken on Clean Elections came 28 months later — the amendment last week asking taxpayers to shoulder the bulk of the funding burden.
“The only thing that has changed is that we are closer to an election so the leadership bit the bullet to gut the law,” said Michael Festa (D-35th Middlesex), a supporter of Clean Elections. Festa, who voted against the funding amendment, represents half of Stoneham and Melrose.
The Clean Elections account holds $22.4 million. Analysts say a minimum of $40 million will be necessary to fully fund Clean Elections for 2002. The House might as well ask 100,000 citizens to pay $100 more in taxes voluntarily each year, a Globe columnist jibed.
Representative Paul Casey (D-34th Middlesex) voted for the amendment; he has opposed Clean Elections from the outset.
“I don’t think public money should go to private candidates. If people knew their money could go to someone like David Duke, they would be outraged,” Casey said.
Casey represents Winchester, half of Stoneham and a sliver of Reading. He is Chairman of the House Taxation Committee and a member of Speaker Thomas Finneran’s leadership team.
Casey said that the funding amendment is consistent with the initial wording of the initiative. This is true. Casey said many other programs could make better use of $10 million than funding lawn signs and bumper stickers. This is a reasonable argument. Casey said the $22.4 in the Clean Elections account may be necessary to save programs for seniors and special education children. This is pushing it, but just within the bounds of credibility.
But Casey said that the leadership had hoped to sit down and work out problems before the law took effect. He said that because this didn’t occur and because the law is “rife with problems” the funding vote was a last resort. This argument is weak because two years of nothing elapsed during which time no votes on any amendments to Clean Elections made it to the floor of the House.
Although Casey’s personal opposition to giving public money to private campaigns sounds sincere, his defense for the means used to undercut Clean Elections reads like a party memo.
But Casey stands behind his means as well as the desired end — to kill Clean Elections. He said that the voice of the people sometimes asks for things logic or the law won’t allow. In 1990 voters asked for free and equal broadcast time for candidates, and in 1986 voters asked for the death penalty. The Courts overturned these votes.
“I’m elected to do what I think is best for my constituents,” Casey said. “And when you explain Clean Elections clearly, people agree with me.”
A 2000 Casey campaign survey indicated that 80 percent of his constituents opposed Clean Elections. The district voted two to one for Clean Elections in 1998.
Festa said that people want public financing and that the issue is heating up not because of controversy over the content or quality of the law but because of how the Legislature is acting.
“People voted to change their form of democracy,” Festa said. “This issue is getting a lot of attention because the Legislature has gone so far to frustrate the will of the people that people see right through it.”
Clean Elections makes it easier for people to challenge incumbents. Voting for Clean Elections takes tax dollars from career politicians and gives the money to challengers determined to beat them who otherwise couldn’t afford to run.
Festa acknowledges that the law has problems. He would like the threshold for qualification to be higher, for example. But just as the recent assault rifle ban was passed and then amended to include antique weapons, so too could Clean Elections get the go ahead with an eye toward future refinement.
Senate President Thomas Birmingham, a Chelsea Democrat, has vowed not to alter the Clean Elections funding formula, but regardless of the Senate vote, an eventual conference committee of both Houses is expected to go the way of Finneran and the status quo. The vote earlier this year to eliminate term limits for the Speaker was similarly an ideologically defensible position that, in cold, hard fact, maintained the existing power base.
However, lawsuits from candidates hoping to take advantage of Clean Elections could shake things up. In the past, as Casey noted, the Courts have overturned the voice of the people. These things work both ways.
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