Connecticut Defies its "Corrupticut" Nickname, Making History for Clean Elections

"I've been waiting for 31 years for this...it was worth the wait."
- Sidney Garvais, founder, Common Cause of Connecticut

The Connecticut legislature made history this month when the House and Senate voted in the wee hours of the morning on December 1st to approve a Clean Elections bill.

Spurred by the imprisonment of its disgraced, still-jailed former Governor John Rowland and the grassroots campaigning powers of local citizens, the Connecticut Legislature became the first in the nation to set campaign finance restrictions by its own initiative. In six other states, it has been passed either by voter initiative or by one legislative body making rules for another.

The idea is simple: Candidates for the Connecticut Legislature or any statewide office who raise a modest amount of seed money from small donors to prove their legitimacy qualify for public funds -- ranging from $25,000 for a state House race to $3 million for a gubernatorial campaign. In return, they must pledge to spurn private donations.

The Clean Election movement takes aim at the corrosive power of special interest money. As Marge Mead, a clean election campaigner from Arizona quoted in Democracy's Edge, "Big campaign donors aren't in it for altruism. They don't consider their money a contribution; they consider it an investment."

Under the Clean Elections system candidates will be free to run without relying on lobbyist contributions or wealthy donors in races for state offices, and so, once in office will only have to answer to the voters.

The impact of Clean Election laws elsewhere has been astonishingly quick and measurable. In the four years after the clean elections laws passed, the number of candidates and voter turnout in Arizona went up by a quarter, and the number of minority candidates rose substantially. In Maine, where the movement started, more than 80 percent of last year's legislative candidates rejected private money, freeing them to spend more time talking to voters about the issues instead of having to schmooze with the state's political big spenders.

At present, Clean Elections laws exist in: Arizona and Maine for state-wide elections; North Carolina for judicial elections; New Mexico for the Public Regulation Commission; Vermont for governor and lieutenant-governor; and in New Jersey, where there is a legislative pilot program in effect for the 2005 and 2007 cycles. "Clean" programs have also passed this year in Portland, Oregon and Albuquerque, New Mexico. The victory in Connecticut shows that while still outside the national radar, the Clean Elections movement is steadily gaining ground.

In Connecticut, Yale Students for Clean Elections successfully galvanized citizens to phone their legislatures. The Yale Daily News quotes member Ted Fertik, "The time that we were calling [state Senate Majority Leader Martin] Looney's office, by the end of the day his aide was picking up the phone saying, 'Are you calling about campaign finance reform?' We got the message."

Sidney Garvais, who founded Common Cause of Connecticut in 1971, commented to the Hartford Courant outside the Senate Chamber on the importance of making a long term commitment, "I've been waiting for 31 years for this," he said. "It was worth the wait." In more than thirty states, through groups such as Public Campaign and Common Cause, people are actively working to pass comprehensive publicly financed elections through grassroots campaigns.

For more information on the nonprofit groups in Connecticut that were key to passing the new legislation visit: Public Campaign; Connecticut Citizen Action Group; Clean Up Connecticut Campaign; and Yale Students for Clean Elections; Yale Daily News Article by Sarah Mishkin published on 12/2/05; Hartford Courant Article by Mark Pazniokas and Christopher Keating on 12/1/05.

Lappé is a pioneer in democratic thought and action. Democracy's Edge exemplifies her path blazing role in keeping democracy alive in our time.
-Cornel West
Professor, Princeton University

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