"If Knox is to be stopped, rivals must act swift-ly"

Published on April 20, 2007 11:24 AM
by Paul Sherman

File Under: Contributions & Limits, Political Committees & 527s

"Reformers," who don't like spending by self-financed millionaires or by independent groups, have put themselves in a bit of a bind.  As the Philadelphia Daily News reports, Tom Knox, a self-financed mayoral candidate, has taken a wide lead over his closest rivals, U.S. Reps. Bob Brady and Chaka Fattah.  How is it that two sitting Congressmen are at such a fundraising disadvantage?  The answer, as it turns out, is "reform":

"With his four rivals hobbled by new city campaign-finance limits, Knox has dumped more than $5 million of his own money into his campaign, most of it for TV ads that portray him as a poor-boy-made-good who wants to wrest City Hall from Philadelphia's corrupt pay-to-play culture.

"Knox has outspent Brady on TV ads by nearly 5 to 1 and Fattah 10 to 1 as he's moved from dead-last to top of the polls."

With less than a month to go before the primary, what can be done about the entirely foreseeable anticompetitive effects of these contribution limits?  According to one political analyst, "the only way to stop Tom Knox now is for a 527 to take him on . . .."  

For a "reformer," this is a difficult position indeed.  Can they sit idly by while a millionaire "buys" his way into office, or will they endorse independent expenditures by a Swift-Boat-style "stealth PAC"?  Perhaps they'll simply lament, "If only they'd passed a 'Millionaire's Amendment.'"

Whatever they choose to do in the short-run, we can confidently predict that their long-run "solution" will involve more regulation.  To "reformers," the situation in Philadelphia is not the natural consequence of regulation, but rather a consequence of regulation that has not gone far enough.  This attitude should make all supporters of free speech wonder: how far must regulation go before all of its perverse unintended consequences are addressed to the "reformers'" satisfaction?  And, at that point, what will be left of the First Amendment?

Update: For another article on the unintended consequences of reform, check out this article from today's Columbus Dispatch, "Ethics law a brick wall."  From the article:

"The workers in the Franklin County engineer's office who keep streets plowed, patched and drained likely didn't pay much attention to Ohio's new pay-to-play campaign-finance-reform bill.

But now, commissioners say, the hastily passed ethics law means they can't vote on a routine contract for these 92 employees, because one commissioner took a $5,000 contribution from the union."