Only Money

Campaign finance reform bites supporters in the rear.

Matt Welch from the July 2004 issue

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For example, Buckley says a group qualifies for federal regulation if it engages in the "express advocacy" of supporting or attacking a specific candidate. McCain-Feingold, meanwhile, says state parties and committees qualify for regulation only if they are involved in "federal election activity" (such as get-out-the-vote drives or ads that mention candidates), while Mc-Connell prohibits federal officeholders from coordinating closely with 527s and limits political ads aired shortly before an election.

If politically active 527s are treated like political parties, as McCain wants, people completely uninvolved with the lawmaking and campaign fund raising process likely would be judged by McCain-Feingold's "federal election activity" standard designed for political parties, even though the groups are incapable of the quid pro quo corruption the original campaign finance laws were designed to combat. Independent advocacy, which was singled out for protection by Buckley, would suffer a devastating blow.

"It would be huge," Smith says. "It would wipe out groups all across the country that have engaged in issue discussion over the years and engaged in political activity."

In the Internet age, such discussion and activity have translated into scores of thousands of Web sites, magazines, and other widely available packages of information. Maybe when they no longer receive Sierra magazine in their mailboxes, journalists will understand how campaign finance reform abridges free speech.