Separating the Clashing Political Titans
Getting My Wish... Commentary on the Proposals of Bulow, Ayres & Ackerman
Congressional Collusion
Philosophical and Historical Foundations of the American Political System
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The essential idea is that the transaction we call a campaign contributuion is too open. We presently have a campaign finance system that compels disclosure of the donor's identity. In nineteenth century, we had a system of balloting that compelled disclosure. The parties and candidates printed color-coded ballots so they see who voted for whom on election day. The secret ballot put an end to that.
This proposal seeks to complete the shielding of the citizen from illegitimate influence. It seeks to legalize persuasion as the sole means of obtaining campaign financing for candidates.
The frequently asked questions with short answers.
Who is allowed to contribute? Any Voter.
Who can receive contributions? Candidates.
How is the contribution made? With a 'debit card' and special reader in a secure booth.
Are there any limits? No limits on the total amount you can give, but you might have to make multiple donations at multiple times and places.
How are the candidates' funds managed? By a 'blind trust' which issues them 'debit cards' to make expenditures.
What does this system disclose? That you did make a donation, but not how much nor to whom.
What about credit and loans? Not allowed.
What about the candidate's own contributions? Candidate's are disclosed.
Can one candidate donate to another candidate? Yes, fully disclosed.
Who pays for administration? The taxpayers who pay for the election.
What about independent speech and expenditures? No restrictions.
Will anybody contribute under such a system? Some will, most don't now and won't start. Some will make independent expenditures. Why do some people vote?
Will candidates get enough money? Some will, some won't. Just like today, winners and losers will always want more, more, more. The voters decide just like they decide the election.
Read on below...
I have susupended my congressional campaign and shut down the website and P.O. box. Delays in litigation now before the Oklahoma State Supreme Court make planning and funding a campaign in 2006 nearly impossible.
I have a two-part article on ballot access restrictions appearing in Diogenes Fall and Winter editions. This national journal is dedicared to judicial reform.
This idea originated independently with me in 1973 as "The Secret Voucher Plan". The monograph here is a recent exposition of the same basic concept.
Sometime in the mid-1980's, (my notes are unavailable) I discovered Prof. Alexander Heard had presented an idea for anonymous contributions in the late 1950s using special postal money orders in The Cost of Democracy, 1962.
To the best of my present knowledge, the concept was resurfaced in 1997 (by Ian Ayres and Jeremy Bulow. Since the subject of campaign finance reform is once again before the Congress, I am presenting my conception of why and how the principle of anonymity should advance reform of this political process without mangling civil rights.
Slashing the Gordian Knot
of Campaign Finance Reform:
A Plan for Anonymous Contributions
Copyright 1994, 1995, 1996, 2001
by D. Frank Robinson
difficult problem with unexpected cleverness, simplicity or audacity.
This monograph summarizes a proposal to reform American political campaign financing to enable citizens to make truly anonymous contributions to candidates' campaigns using electronic funds transfer technology. The goal is to reduce the suspicions of voters that campaign contributors improperly influence the policy decisions of elected public officials.
The anonymous contribution plan proposed here is a conceptual extension of a political innovation from the late nineteenth century - the Australian or secret ballot. This procedure is now taken for granted as the basis for public confidence in the administration of elections. The American public looks favorably on this arrangement. Privacy assures the voter of independence in casting his vote. Many people probably assume the secret ballot existed at the time the original United States Constitution was drafted. In fact, it has only been in general use for about 100 years.
Elections by secret ballot have remedied a host of former abuses. Since ballots are administered and uniformly structured by the government and voluntarily cast with privacy by the individual citizen, the outright vote- buying, ballot box stuffing and the intimidation or coercion of voters on election day are historic relics of political corruption in the United States - long gone and nearly forgotten except in other countries.
The anonymous contribution plan sets up the same kind of relationship between the campaign donor and the candidate that exists between the voter and the candidate today - anonymity. At present campaign donations are highly susceptible to abuse - or the suspicion of abuse. Candidates know who gives to their campaign - and who doesn't. Donors know the candidates know this. Donors and candidates know - thanks to laws requiring public disclosure - who donates to opposing candidates. This encourages hostile speculation about the motives of campaign donors and the independence of judgment of candidates.
The conventional approach to campaign finance reform depends on revealing the identities of campaign contributors, but it does not necessarily reduce suspicions of undue influence and it has other undesirable consequences. Disclosure of contributors can deter some citizens from making larger contributions or any contributions at all. It even encourages some donors to make offsetting contributions to two or more opposing candidates - just to be "impartial," "hedge their bets" or "assure access." Disclosure of contributors' identities can even place a conventional candidate at a disadvantage if some donor to his campaign can be portrayed as controversial in some way. The candidate is suspect by association if he accepts money from a donor who looks disreputable in some way in the eyes of some voters or other contributors. Disclosure of contributors can act as a device to keep candidates in the mainstream consensus of the dominant political factions and deter "maverick" donors. Candidates who attract controversial contributors, for whatever reason, are regarded as politically unreliable by traditional mainstream contributors. Candidates with innovative views on public policy attract contributors who are regarded as controversial or deviant. While disclosure of the facts about a candidate - that is, the fact for which he is responsible - is the crux of public examination, which a campaign engenders, the disclosure of facts about contributors (their identities, associations and opinions) resembles the tactics of old-time ward heelers. These old-time political operatives used any prejudices they could play on to ostracize opponents and their would-be supporters. Contributors should be able to give to any candidate for any reason they think sufficient without being scrutinized by anyone, public or private.
Candidates should be able to accept financial support from any voter without scrutiny. The only concern is that no hidden strings are attached either by the donor or the candidate.
The legitimate issue in election campaign finance reform is to set the terms of the transaction between the donor and the candidate so the donor's decision of how much to give to the candidate is as independent as possible - no strings. These conditions are central to the practical exercise of First Amendment rights of political expression in election campaigns and the ultimate authority of the citizen over the government. The candidate's independence in deciding how to spend whatever he does get is just as central to the ultimate control of the citizen over the government. If the candidate does not have the widest possible discretion in spending, disclosure of information which is most useful to the voter will not be as forthcoming, for example, information about the opposing candidates' policy orientation and personal characteristics. Speculation about who is giving money to whom for what conceivable motive does not enlighten the voter and does not belong in the political discourse. But so long as the system allows the possibility of such corruption, candidates, supporters and the media will engage in mongering conspiracy theories of campaign finance - even when baseless - for a variety of motives.
On the other hand, when the stakes are high enough, as they sometimes are, disclosure of contributors does not deter them or the candidates from making deals for a contribution. Any regime of disclosure will be overwhelmed by the impracticality of draconian enforcement in the face of constitutional protection for civil liberties and due process.
Of course, proponents of contributor disclosure can advocate raising the stakes for conviction even higher - failure to disclose could be made a capital offense.
The issue of central concern to the voters is to prevent any secret bargains for campaign funds. The answer is to make the transfer of campaign funds by donors as neutral or opaque as possible, from the viewpoint of the candidate, so the funds cannot carry any implied or explicit influence - beyond support for the candidate's policy orientation and reputation. This consideration serves as a major premise to advocates of compulsory public financing of election campaigns. When the money for campaigning comes from the government's treasury, it seems to have been laundered of its original private, personal component.
However, compulsory public financing must deal with the problem of allocating funds: who gets funds (and who is excluded), how much funding is appropriate (or too little, or too much), and what kinds of expenditures are appropriate for government financed campaigns (too "tasteless," too harsh, too effective)? All allocation problems become censorship problems.
If all campaign financing comes directly from anonymous private sources, then the candidate - as an officeholder - is unable to consider the specific sources of campaign donations in his policy decisions. This is what the anonymous contribution plan accomplishes - without the censorship issues raised by arbitrary schemes for compulsory allocation of public, but really private, funds.
For the remainder of this discussion we will assume the context of elections for federal office: President, vice-president, U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives.
Whatever the transfer mechanisms, all campaign finance systems discriminate between the sources of money.
Whom shall we allow to finance American political campaigns?
To be representative and productive, as well as constitutional, a large group of people must be able to participate as voluntary donors in the anonymous contribution plan. Certainly all U.S. citizens of voting age have a strong claim to be within the pool of potential donors. Who else might raise a constitutional claim to inclusion? Should the plan include others, for example, all resident aliens of voting age? Perhaps others should be included.
One preference is that only those who are eligible to vote in federal elections are eligible to make donations. After all, these voters determine the outcome of an election. Why shouldn't they directly control the costs of the candidates' campaigns for their votes? This criteria would exclude any others from making monetary contributions - including felons, minors, resident aliens and foreigners. This criterion also eases the administration of the enforcement of the plan and insures a higher degree of integrity.
Who should receive contributions?
Any person constitutionally eligible to seek a federal office would be eligible to be the recipient - beneficiary - of anonymous contributions. The benefit is untainted financing for an election campaign for federal public office.
Just as the use of a uniform ballot is compulsory and not optional for the candidates, so use of the plan exclusively as a conduit for their monetary contributions is also compulsory for candidates. Under the plan any person, eligible to hold a federal elective office, who registers with a Federal Anonymous Campaign Contribution Trust Fund (FACCT) is a legitimate candidate. Candidate registration sets up an account to receive donations on that candidate's behalf and make campaign expenditures at the candidate's direction. Accepting contributions or paying out funds for his campaign from any source other than the FACCT is a violation of law for the candidate and makes him ineligible to hold office.
How is the contribution made?
The physical transfer of funds from the private donor to public beneficiary - the candidate - never occurs except through the facility of the system. The private funds donated to the candidates are in the custody of the Federal Anonymous Campaign Contribution Trust Fund (FACCT) until they are paid out to private vendors. The FACCT accounting system allows funds to flow from the private donors to the ultimate recipients - private vendors who actually perform the services and provide the goods which candidates use to campaign. No one can tamper with the funds without overcoming safeguards in the system that would be enormously burdensome to any candidate's campaign if attempted individually.
Allocating donor funds to candidates is accomplished electronically by a procedure similar to casting a ballot. Actually each unit of monetary donation is similar to a vote. However, the donor is allowed, even encouraged, to cast multiple "dollar- ballots" in making contributions.
All persons eligible to donate are issued voter-donor identification cards which are an electronically machine-readable card - very much like an automatic teller machine card.
A donor must appear in person with his voter-donor identification card at a designated financial institution with the funds (cash or his own personal check. It would make no difference) he wants to contribute to a federal candidate or candidates. (Special procedures would allow the infirm to make donations in a manner similar to casting an absentee ballot.) These funds are exchanged at the bank for specially encoded machine- readable electronic vouchers in fixed denominations, perhaps $10, $50, and $500. The electronic vouchers only work at the bank where they are issued and electronically "self-destruct" if not used promptly at the proper machine. Thus, it is pointless to smuggle these vouchers out of the bank, give them to another person and have him make the contribution. The computer system places encrypted magnetic data on the voucher cards each time they are issued to the donor to assure authenticity and the integrity of the system.
The donor then goes to a specially programmed ATM-like machine, pushes the appropriate buttons indicating which candidates will get a contribution, inserts the desired vouchers, receives an acknowledgment slip which documents that a transaction has taken place and the contribution is completed on his part. As the voucher cards are processed by the machine, it erases specific data and prepares the voucher for recycled use by another donor. The total supply of voucher cards in use is very small. They are used over and over with altered encrypted coding, by different donors to make their campaign donation transactions.
This procedure shields the identity of the donor from the candidate just as the secret ballot prevents the candidate and election authorities from knowing whom the citizen is casting his vote for. The donor has proof of a donation, but it does not reveal to whom or the specific amount of any donation made. All the details of the transaction are recorded internally by the computer system. However, the identity of the donor is automatically erased from the system as soon as "the books are balanced" by the system. Attempting to discover or disclose the link between the donor and the candidate would be a criminal offense.
The bank at the close of each business day "reads the machine," balances the books, and electronically transfers credits to the FACCT accounts of the various candidates who received donations that day. Before beginning the next business day the bank retrieves the reprocessed electronic voucher cards for reuse from the ATM-type unit. The system's hardware and software monitor all the internal procedures at the site for security.
The physical custody of the funds remains on deposit with the bank as an asset of a "blind trust" - the Federal Anonymous Campaign Contribution Trust Fund. It serves a similar purpose as a "blind trust" for any government official - to minimize conflicts of interests or misuse of funds. The use of this "blind trust," however, is required for any person who desires to campaign for federal office with contributions. Perhaps, only if a candidate made no campaign expenditures and accepted no contributions would he be exempt from the FACCT.
Are there any limits?
There is no limit on the total amount any donor could contribute to a candidate. If a campaign contribution cannot possibly influence a candidate - because he is, in effect, blind to the source - then there is no justification for limiting the amount any person may contribute to any specific candidate or all candidates. What the candidate can't know can't prejudice him regarding any specific person.
The only exception to daily transfers to the candidates' accounts is that any contribution over a certain amount - say, five thousand dollars - is automatically spread over several days so that it is submerged and intermingled with other contributions. Furthermore, while a donor can make multiple donations - just as he can vote for several different candidates - he can access the machine only once in any business day at any particular location. To give more than $5,000 per day, the donor must use the machines at several different institutions and bear the burden of travel.
How are the candidate's funds managed?
The candidates' accounts with the FACCT are each credited with aggregated funds from many donors and many banks without revealing the origins of the funds to the candidates' at the close of each business day. Legal custody of the funds remains with the Federal Anonymous Campaign Contribution Trust (FACCT) for disbursement. The candidates have total control of the disbursements for conducting their campaigns. Based on daily, publicly disclosed, electronic statements provided by the FACCT, the candidates' are able to disburse funds for campaign expenditures by using special expenditure vouchers or debit cards issued by the FACCT and redeemable by vendors for cash or credit to their account at a financial institution. The FACCT fully discloses and publishes these disbursements daily. For liquidity management, the assets of the Trust may be invested on a day-to-day basis in U.S. Treasury bills.
What does the system disclose?
It tells us how much money the candidate is receiving. It tells us how he is spending that money and whom he is doing business within his campaign. What else needs to be revealed?
What about credit and loans?
The anonymous contribution plan makes all political campaigns pay-as-you-go enterprises. There is no deficit campaign spending. Private loans to candidates or credit by vendors for campaign purposes are prohibited. The funds contributed by donors are the custodial property of the FACCT and the Trust guarantees payment to vendors with vouchers which the Trust dispenses to the candidates to make purchases.
What about the candidate's own contributions or payments to himself?
The Plan allows any candidate to make unlimited personal contributions to his own campaign, but there is an exception to the anonymity and confidentially principle in the case the candidate's own donations. The candidate's own donations are public. Because he is a candidate, his donor ID card is flagged and all his donations to his own campaign are disclosed. The candidate can claim vouchers for any legal purpose in any amount up to the balance of his account. The candidate is also regarded as a "vendor" and he can draw vouchers on his own behalf. Of course, all such withdrawals might be considered income and subject to the usual onerous taxation. If a candidate pays himself "an excessive stipend," then it is the public's business to make that judgment, not governmental authorities. The reason for not allowing the candidate's confidentiality in making his donations is to prevent the candidate from using any concealed assets to finance his campaign. Neither full financial disclosure by candidates is compromised, nor is the administration of the Internal Revenue Code compromised. After all, citizens do not usually object to a candidate financing his own campaign - so long as they know it and so long as they know that no one else's money can carry any more influence than their own. Every contributor's dollar is just as good as any other's. Each donor must trust the candidate, if elected, to give him his money's worth - equality of representation - for his contribution and no more. If the elected official fails enough people, the money - and the votes - will dry up. After all, isn't that why elections are periodic and (sometimes) competitive?
Can one candidate contribute to another candidate?
Every candidate can make anonymous contributions to other candidates just like everybody else does. Each candidate can also make publicly disclosed transfers from his own campaign account by expenditure vouchers to other candidates. The propriety of such transfers, again, is a matter for the voters to judge.
The anonymous contribution plan makes compulsory limits on the amount of campaign contributions unnecessary. It makes reporting of contributors (and the invasion of their privacy by inquires about their political allegiances and motives) irrelevant and reporting of contributed amounts to specific candidates automatic and complete. It makes reporting of expenditures automatic and complete. Because the contributions are anonymous there is no basis for limiting the amount of campaign contributions, so there is no basis for limiting the amount of expenditures. People individually decide the amount to donate voluntarily and anonymously. Their donations, in effect, purchase information about candidates from the candidates and nothing more.
Who foots the bill for running this system?
Since taxpayers accept bearing the cost of administering fair and free elections, isn't it reasonable for taxpayers to bear the administrative costs of the anonymous contribution plan? It is clearly in their interests.
What about "independent" political speech and expenditures?
What if the candidate conspires with a private person to buy campaign ads touting the candidate? If everything the candidate pays for must carry a disclosure statement "Paid for by...etc.", any campaign material which does not have the candidate's disclosure statement is self-evidently a non-candidate expenditure. People will just have to judge for themselves. Everyone has a First Amendment right to make such expenditures as a non- candidate. This plan regulates ONLY candidates for office and ONLY the method which citizens must use to convey money to those candidates.
As an sidebar consider this possibility: You may think Joe Doaks is making deals for "independent" expenditures to buy radio time. You buy time to make your charges or you simply buy time to talk up his opponent(s). Freedom of speech does not always mean speech at no cost to you.
As a matter of fact, candidates hate "independent" expenditures because they can't control them. They want to do all the talking, voters are supposed to do all the listening and THEN vote. There is no ground for assuming that "independent" expenditures always help the candidate(s) they are intended to favor. It is possible that people will always pay far more attention to what the candidate says than they will to the words that others try to put in the candidate's mouth. For example, people seem to trust their own judgment of what they see on CSPAN over what much of the media tell them about the same events.
All "free" media exposure is a kind of "independent" expenditure. Candidates meet with editors and reporters to influence them to be "fair" - that is, "at least, don't favor the other candidate(s)." Is that collusion?
The issue of "excessive independent expenditures" arises only if the agenda is to restrict and ration and distort freedom of political speech by private citizens. Yes, this plan restricts the freedom of candidates who would be officials. The Constitution is designed to restrict the freedom of government officials. If you are a private citizen - not seeking election to any office - you can spend whatever you have.
Finally, the question many would-be candidates have been pondering: Will anybody contribute under such a system?
The anonymous contribution plan proposed here entitles the candidate to get exactly what the people freely believe he deserves to run for office and nothing more. If the public wants to control campaign financing themselves in this way, the politician will just have to deal with it.
In summary, the proposed plan provides a system of voluntary public financing of election campaigns for federal offices. It is the public as individuals, not the politicians, allocate funding by a directly democratic process. The plan accomplishes the same objective of anonymizing funding as compulsory taxpayer financing - except the individual taxpayers control it directly and voluntarily. Technology provides security and integrity. The existing banking system provides normal and usual banking services for the Federal Anonymous Campaign Contribution Trust Fund and a secure location for the citizen to vote with his dollars. The Trust monopolizes campaign accounting for all federal candidates and imposes uniformity, security and a public audit. On the other hand, candidates have nearly absolute discretion in directing the use of funds. Vendors have absolute assurance of payment. The citizenry has the assurance of knowing that candidates are supported only by them without hidden financial strings attached.
Slashing the Gordian Knot of Campaign Finance requires the shield of donor anonymity as well as the sword of financial disclosure. Without the shield, we risk impaling our political system on the sword.
In 1973 Mickey Edwards, former congressman from Oklahoma and now of the Aspen Institute, was the Editor of Private Practice magazine and I was his assistant. I asked to research the issue of campaign finance with a view to preparing an article. Over the next several weeks I consulted numerous articles and books while debate heated up in Washington which was finally bolted together as the campaign finance act of 1974 - the engine so much political smog over the last generation.
One evening I was free associating about a phrase from the 1964 presidential campaign about "Ballots not Bullets." It seemed to me that while ballots were supposed to be anonymous, intact bullets were the undeniable ballistic decendant of the gun that fired them. If anonymous or "secret" ballots were accepted as a good thing, then what if money contributions could be made anonymous might that also be a good thing? It appeared to me an article about whomever had already thought up the idea might be interesting. I went looking for the professor of political science or whomever had already developed the idea. I failed at that time to find that person. I began to elaborate arguments pro and con for anonymous campaign contributions using the secret ballot as a template. After a few weeks I engaged Mickey about "my" idea. He admitted he had never read about the idea either, but he had philosophical and practical objections, so the article was killed before it was written. Regardless of my admiration for Mickey and respect for his intellect, I found his objections unconvincing and I continued to work on my own. Not long after that Mickey quit Private Practice and I soon followed when Llewellyn Rockwell , now of Lew Rockwell.com, was named Editor. Mr. Rockwell, was never implicated in this Gordian saga by the way.
The next year I worked for Mickey again as Research Director in his first, but just barely unsuccessful run for Congress. His defeat was more bitter for me than it was for him and we drifted apart. I had no role in his successful election in 1976.
In the meantime, I tried to find an ally in David Boren, then a State Representative and later Governor, the U. S. Senator, and now President of the University of Oklahoma. Mr. Boren totally blew me off at a hearing before the Elections & Privileges Committee in 1974. David Boren is a very smart man also, but my presentation must have been awful for him not to get ahead of me. Thankfully, he has proven a great judge of talent for an athletic director and a head football coach, or at least he has learned how to listen.
Finally, I wrote up a paper, boxed everything up and put it aside until the mid-Eighties, when I tried to update the subject matter after a decade for an article to the Oklahoma Gazette. A query letter resulted in a flat rejection. But the preparation effort did bring the discovery that I was not the sole discoverer of the idea. I found that the esteemed Professor Herbert Alexander had presented a concept based on anonymous contributions using special postal money orders in The Cists of Democracy in 1962 If I could have gotten an interview with Alexander in 1973, I am pretty damn sure we would have run it - especially if he had disavowed his idea or even if he had not. After twelve years I got an article idea I expected was spike proof - until the Gazette spike it.
Then in 1994, I wrote the monograph - essentially as it appears here, put it under copyright, and submitted it unsolicted to Edward Crane of the Cato Institute, because of a previous aquaintance. Ed, like Mickey, had philosophical objections - but they were different. Ed totally supports disclosure without limits. Of course, as much as I respect Ed Crane, I continued to perseve.
So, here we are again after thirty years, the conventional left-right deadlock continues and neither side has a new idea. It all seems like a revival of re-run of an old Broadway musical " based on a story about a man named Lear" - (Beatles, Paperback Writer). Same plot, same dialogue, many of the original cast. Please, Dave Barry, we need some relief - desperately!
So the Congress debates campaign finance reform again - and again - and we shall soon know how many angels and can dance on the end of a split hair.
The gross partiality toward incumbents in the present system is ably described by former FEC chairman, Bradley A. Smith in Unfree Speech:The Folly of Campaign Finance reform.
S o you are cordially invited the tear into my handiwork and attempt to shame me back into oblivion. The gauntlet lies at your feet.
Shamelessly,
D. Frank Robinson
A useful query. What if I just loan the candidate I want to be indebted to me my credit/debit card to use?
Presumably, this would be to enable the candidate to buy personal stuff. Because under my proposal, all campaign expenditures from media time to coffee for volunteers would have to be paid for exclusively by the using the official "FACCT" card - forgetting to use the right card would be a felony count. However, the candidate still has a personal life with private expenses. Lending a candidate a credit card to take a vacation or rent a hooker may buy you influence, but it won't necessarily influence the voters - unless, the hooker could give him the winning margin. In cases like these, why bother to create a paper trail at all? If you want to bribe he candidate, just lobby him by taking him along with you on an expense paid vacation and invite him to sleep with you daughter? These are not original ideas.
This issue falls more in the realm of "corrupt practices" and are valid issues for lobbying activities, but have no direct application to the financing of election campaigns.
Why isn't your plan voluntary for the candidates?
It could be. In which case the candidates who participate would have to pay a fee for services just as they do for advertising. If voter pressure were sufficient, then most all candidates would have to participate. I see no big problem.
Born in Oklahoma just about about nine months after Pearl Harbor,.his father was a paratrooper who jumped at Normandy.and survived. Part of his family claims descent from the Randolphs of Virginia, other ancestors were Irish, Cherokee Indians, German Jews and probably a few other people. His family political tradition was Roosevelt Democrats and one cranky old Republican aunt.
He lived with his maternal grandparents during WW II and until he was ten. He lived with his mother and step father, a U. S. Army explosives expert until the rest of the family was posted to Germany when he was in high school. Frank refused to be drafted for the occupation and remained in the U. S. to play football, read science fiction, dance to rock and roll and read Ayn Rand.
Frank graduated from Harrah High School, a suburb of Oklahoma City, in 1961 and attended what is now the University of Central Oklahoma. He spent most of his second semester of college in the hospital, but recovered to serve in the Air Force as a "weatherman" from 1962 -1966 working for the U. S. Army - which he had tried to avoid being drafted into.
Thereafter, he attended the University of Oklahoma - where he didn't play football - got married, worked as a tax consultant, editorial assistant, had a great son, abandoned the Republican Party, helped to found the Libertarian Party, started and failed a business, got divorced, wrote computer software manuals, worked for a public school district, survived tornadoes and a bombing - actually slept through the bombing - and now works for a telecommunications company. As he approaches middle age - ahem - he looks forward to retirement in Costa Rica or New Mexico - if the stock market will just co-operate.
Until then he enjoys a comitted relationship with one of the world's great cooks, collects vintage computers, hoards software, dreams of being a blues guitar performer and winning a metal at the Senior Games in a sprint event.
'Here lies an outrageous dancer, a jock cut down before his time, a maverick idealist without a career path and the father of a son without any of his sire's flaws except his sense of humor."
Now go write your obit.
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Since anonymous funds cannot be returned to the donors, I would propose that every candidate be required to desiginate a 'beneficiary.'
A beneficiary could be a lottery open to all registered voters with a certain mimimum 'prize' to be distributed among a minimum number of winners; or the beneficiary could be non-for-profit organization(s); or the beneficiary could be a pre-designated successor candidate(s). The transfer would be tax-free, of course. I would oppose letting the money go to the government.
If a candidate pulls out of a race he would not automatically release the funds, but he would have the authority to transfer his surplus to another candidate - perhaps the candidate of his own party who defeated him in a primary election. I fail to see this as a problem. 03/28/2001
The relevant section of the LP Platform says:
"The Australian ballot system, introduced into the United States in the nineteenth century, is an abridgement of freedom of expression and of voting rights. Under it, the names of all the officially approved candidates are printed in a single government sponsored format and the voter indicates his or her choice by marking it or by writing in an approved but unlisted candidate's name. We should return to the previous electoral system where there was no official ballot or candidate approval at all, and therefore no state or federal restriction of access to a "single ballot." Instead, voters submitted their own choices and had the option of using "tickets" or cards printed by candidates or political parties"
The conclusion is stated first that a (any or all?) secret (Australian) ballot systems are (inherently?) an abridgement of freedom of expression and of voting rights. Is the statement is descriptive of the present regime of secret balloting in the United States?
Yes, I will concede that, as presently administered, the admission requirements for a candidate to be placed on the ballot are too restrictive. I speak as one who has stood on the street and asked for signatures to petition for a place on the ballot in my state many times. But that does not address the central issue: Does a voter have a right to anonymity when he cast a ballot? I know for a fact that the LP has used secret ballots in its proceedings as a voluntary organization.
Does the compelling of anonymity in casting a ballot impair the voter so that a free choice is not possible? It does not. Only the restriction of choices on the ballot impairs the voter's freedom of choice, the anonymity does not. If the voter is allowed to place the name of anyone he chooses on the ballot, his freedom of choice is not impaired by being compelled to do it anonymously. On the contrary, anonymity empowers the voter to exercise his freedom by giving him immunity from coercion or intimidation and reprisal from anyone.
Should we return to the previous system of "full disclosire" of the voter's choice when a ballot is cast?
No!
The defects of the present system are numerous and deserve severe criticism, but the immunity provided the voter in casting an anonymous ballot is the not a defect. In fact it is the only indispensible virtue of the present system.
I will refrain from presenting my own ideas on how the present balloting processes should be reformed.
In conclusion, the "Australian Ballot" plank in the LP Platform should be revised. It's analysis so faulty as to be foolish. It is certainly not a litmus test for libertarianism. 03/29/2001
The answers boil down to this -- those who are compentent and willing to guard can and those who not compentent or unwilling must choose to trust or not trust.
Actually, what I propose is a system based on the Open Source model. Which means that the source code for all the programming needed to operate this system will be freely open for inspection and those who propose to modify the code can post their proposed code for others to peer review. In particular, the cryptographic algorithms and all system software will be open. The most obvious choice for most of the system is the Linux operating system and asymetric or public/private key encryption. One idea I have explored tenatively is the use of "blind private keys."
One issue is not resolved. Should all access be restricted to fixed "public" locations such as a bank or other financial institution or should people be allowed to use some kind of portable device which can be used off the "official" premises - like an absentee ballot. Since the device for the user should not be much larger than a software box or ultralight portable computer. All devices would be "open architecture" as well with no secret components. Furthermore, anyone would be able to manufacture or build it from a kit of standard components.
The point is that aside from the actual keys for encryption of the transactions, nothing in the operating system should be secret. Of course, this is not the way voting ballots are handled -- secrecy , patents and copyrights are the rule when it comes to processing votes. Just try using your own voting machine to cast a ballot!
06/25/2001
What has never been adaquately explained is how taxes collected by compulsion can be redistributed as each individual taxpayer wishes? Collectivization of campaign finance means the individual's preferences are abrogated and all decisions on allocation must assumed by some other agent - the Federal Election Commission perhaps. Who owns the Federal Election Commission? The incumbent Congress, of course..
My proposal avoids the allocation issue. .The individual voter, even if not a net taxpayer, retains full authority to determine the budget - pro rata - of any candidates he chooses. No bureacrats need intervene in the decision. Nevertheless, I salute the ACLU for their support of the First Amendment despite their misguided notion of "public" financing."
Chief Justice Earl Warren,
Reynolds v. Simms (1964)
Not one of my favorite Justices, but well said. Is the right to speak freely on behalf of the candidate of one's choice also of the essence of a democratic society? And do any restrictions on that right thirty days before a primary election or sixty days before a general election (McCain-Feingold) also strike at the heart of representative government?
Just asking before the First Amendment blackout begins...