Posted on 02/20/2002 1:21:09 AM PST by kattracks
Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - The bill that many House liberals called a Valentine's Day present to the American people may quickly be stamped "return to sender" if it is delivered to President Bush for his signature.
The House passed the Shays-Meehan Campaign Finance Bill (H.R. 2356) early the morning of February 14th , over the objections of conservatives who argued that the bill imposed unconstitutional restrictions on the First Amendment rights of issue advocacy groups like the National Rifle Association, the Sierra Club and other groups from across the political spectrum.
Now conservatives on the House Republican Study Committee (RSC) appear to be laying the groundwork for a presidential veto of the bill or significant revisions in the Senate by using Bush's own words.
In an e-mail message circulated to House members and reporters Tuesday, the RSC referred to a letter President Bush wrote to then Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) last year detailing the six principles Bush believed should govern any campaign finance bill sent to the White House for Bush's signature.
According to the RSC, the version of the Shays-Meehan bill passed by the House violates all six principles.
"Not one of President Bush's six reform principles," the RSC memo claims, "is incorporated into Shays-Meehan."
No members were available to comment on whether the RSC memo is an attempt to set up a Bush veto of the bill. But White House has not ruled out a veto.
Those principles laid out by Bush, according to the letter, included:
* Protect the Rights of Individuals to Participate in Democracy
* Maintain Strong Political Parties
* Ban Corporate and Union Soft Money
* Eliminate Involuntary Contributions
* Require Full and Prompt Disclosure
* Promote a Fair, Balanced, and Constitutional Approach
Rep. Todd Akin (R-Mo.), an RSC member, says the bill doesn't even past the first of the president's six "tests."
"Shays-Meehan is blatantly unconstitutional, and is hostile to free speech. It will muzzle citizen groups by preventing them from placing ads on radio and TV 60 days prior to an election," Akin said in a statement. "The right to free speech is one of our most cherished and guarded rights and should not be infringed."
On Bush's second point David Mason, the chairman of the Federal Election Commission, told CNSNews.com the day the bill was considered that he believes it will weaken the parties.
"This is an attack on the political parties," Mason said. "And, to the extent that it survives the courts, it will succeed."
The RSC complains that the bill would severely limit what activities parties could engage in and restrict their fundraising abilities. While some may argue that that, in itself, might not be a bad thing, the RSC says the provisions definitely weaken the parties.
The group points out that Shays-Meehan would also prevent the parties from raising money to donate to other groups, and from making independent or coordinated expenditures on behalf of candidates, "decimating one of the core reasons for parties to exist, to help elect candidates to office."
RSC member Rep. Mark Green (R-Wisc.), says the bill also fails to ban soft money as Bush requested.
"While it bans soft money to national parties, it still allows millions in these unregulated contributions to go to state and local parties," Green argued after the bill was passed. "It doesn't actually attack the soft money problem, it simply shifts it from the national level to the state and local level."
Contrary to providing for the "full and prompt disclosure" called for by Bush, the RSC believes the new requirements for disclosure concerning activity that merely mentions the name of a federal candidate will actually discourage rather than encourage citizens to participate in the political process.
Attorney and campaign finance law expert Cleta Mitchell says Shays-Meehan will have exactly the opposite effect from what the president desired.
"We will have much less disclosure under this bill," Mitchell told CNSNews.com .
Rep. Ernest Istook (R-Okla.), another RSC member, admits there are problems with the current campaign finance system. Nonetheless, he is highly critical of both the Shays-Meehan bill, and its authors.
"The sponsors of this bill were lying to America about what it does and doesn't do. Their bill only pretends to fix things, while making things worse with attacks on free speech, a brand-new set of huge loopholes, and more confusion than ever," Istook said after the early morning vote."
Whether Bush would veto the bill is uncertain, and supporters of the measure have expressed optimism because the White House has not significantly weighed in on the legislation. However, a veto has not been ruled out either.
On the day the Shays-Meehan bill passed the House, presidential Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said Bush "has been very clear that he wants to sign a bill that improves the current system. Parts of that legislation surely do. Other parts are not as fully consistent with the president's principles."
Fleischer added the president will "wait to see what the final form is once it comes out of the Senate, and then he will have something declarative to state. Until then, I'm just not going to presume what action the president would take."
E-mail a news tip to Jeff Johnson.
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What I think I hear you saying is that you support the Republicans because they only advocate X number of unconstitutional things, whereas the Democrats advocate (X times 3) unconstitutional things.
Now I may not think you are right in doing so, but at least you've stated the issue clearly.
It is their plan to make journalists the "fifth branch of government."
It is their last chance to bring about nationalized healthcare.
It is an attempt to install Clinton Progressive media driven Socialism as the new form of Government with the Democratic Party controlling the political process unopposed.
They know that the Clinton Administration was a creation of the media. They know they are at a critical point where Americans are waking up to their brand of Socialism and the dangers it presents. They know that the events of 911 are bringing light to the dangers of liberal government. They must act now before the next election.
Don't know if you're serious with this question, but the metamorphasis occurred when the Supreme Court of the United States rendered an opinion that curtailing money in politics is the same as curtailing speech, and therefore infringes on the First Amendment.
This bill will most likely have some sort of impact on the activities of Free Republic so we really need to watch this very carefully.
It looks like Sen. McConnell is in a good position to send the bill to it's death. Everybody cross your fingers.
If the 60 days doesn't work does the law get changed to 120 days? And if that doesn't work does it go to 180 and so on and so on....
Free speech for me but not for thee? If groups like these get muzzled the next thing you know they are coming right here.
Just a typical day at the office for our elected officials.
Hmm? Here is an excerpt from that:
The split between the White House and GOP House leaders became public Wednesday morning when Fleischer told reporters that if campaign finance reform is enacted, "I believe that you can thank President George W. Bush." Fleischer all but endorsed the two leading measures, saying the Shays-Meehan proposal and a rival would improve the system, "and that is at the end of the day what he is looking for."
That afternoon, Fleischer further backed away from his morning support for Shays-Meehan by attacking a provision in the bill that would allow party committees to pay off old debts with money that was being banned by the legislation. Officials said Bush had not known about the provision when he talked to reporters, although House Republican officials had pointed it out at the morning caucus. "People were going ballistic, so we knew we had a real unifier," a House GOP strategist said.
That the White House's actions proved to be a turning point in the House passage of campaign finance reform is an extraordinary irony. Bush opposed the proposal vigorously during the presidential campaign, although he offered a version of his own. As president, he warmed to the idea, saying he could not be counted on to veto the legislation. But he was no supporter.
This troubled me too for a while, but then I considered his character and his words and actions of the past year, I came to the conclusion that he cannot rubberstamp this bill.
The fact that he does indeed 'say what he means, and mean what he says,' as Dick Cheney has also voiced several times in the past few days, reassures me that he will do the right thing.
We may be guessing, but as others have stated, we've seen before that he was playing chess when his opponents were playing checkers. What matters here is that he's not guessing.
See post #55. That may help you out. I'm not sure either still, but that's a good article, from the WashingtonCOMpost pile. It was also partial text posted on FR:
Bush's Pragmatism Helped Undermine GOP Opposition
http://209.157.64.200/focus/fr/628490/posts
Keep in mind..although most people don't even know what CFR is, they have been hearing about it non-stop now for over 2 weeks. Not just from the liberals, either...they have been hearing about the un-Constitutional-ality (is that a word???LOL!!) of this bill (if they are listening) and one would have to have hope that the "sheeple" are wondering WHY the left is putting up such a stink about getting this passed "so quickly".
The demorats are making it worse for themselves everyday. :-)
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