New Jersey Speaker nixes taxpayer-financed political campaigns

Published on September 2, 2008 01:00 PM

New Jersey Assembly Speaker Joseph J. Roberts Jr., responding to a federal court ruling in Arizona, effectively ended an effort to expand New Jersey's "clean elections" program.

"Speaker Roberts made the right decision to end this expensive experiment," said Sean Parnell, president of the Center for Competitive Politics, which had published a legal memo questioning the constitutionality of matching fund provisions.  "So-called ‘rescue funds' provisions in taxpayer-financed campaign programs penalize political speech, which the Arizona court recognized as an attack on core First Amendment rights."

U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver ruled Friday, August 29, that a provision in Arizona's clean elections law which allows "matching funds" to be distributed to candidates participating in the public-financing program if they are outspent by non-participating opponents or by independent groups was unconstitutional

Speaker Roberts responded to the Arizona ruling by declaring that "[i]n terms of enacting legislation to continue New Jersey's Clean Elections pilot program in 2009, the federal courts have imposed obstacles that are insurmountable given the time frame."

"Taxpayer-financed campaigns have failed to live up to their promises in New Jersey, and so-called "rescue funds" penalize citizens and nonparticipating candidates," Parnell said. "Hopefully, Speaker Roberts will now be able to focus the Assembly's attention on reforms that actually work and that don't infringe on the First Amendment."