One of the other matters hanging in the balance of this election was the fate of city's new campaign finance law.
In the final days of the campaign, I asked as many people as I could if the law would still be challenged, either by continuing the legal argument that the city can't set that law, or by City Council tinkering with the law. Knox was leading for much of this time, and the answer was always -- yes.
This struck me as illogical. Campaign finance changed this election enornmously. Put Knox aside for a minute, and we see a radically leveled playing field. Nutter and Evans hit the streets early and raised a ton of money from a wide base of donors. Brady had to hustle late, but in 2007 managed to raise his share. Fattah lagged in fund-raising -- at least based on what was reported April 30, which was the last overall campaign finance report.
I will tell you, if we didn't have campaign finance laws, that order would be reversed -- Fattah was the front-runner for a long time, and money would have gravitated to him. Feel free to debate whether you think it is good or bad that Nutter and Evans won the fund-raising battle, but it's definitely different than it would have been without the limits.
This was true anecdotally as well. I heard stories during this campaign of law partners sitting out of any giving because they were afraid the firm would lose city business, thanks to the new pay to play law. I heard stories of well-off Philadelphians relieved that their total outlay was capped at $5,000 per candidate, which made it easy to spread the money around. It's just different, different, different.
OK. And then we have Knox. Knox, the self-funded candidate who has the right -- granted specifically by the Supreme Court -- to put any amount of his wealth into this race. And Knox, who single-handedly led to the James Kenney-sponsored bill to change the donation limits and may lead to the same effort post-election.
Knox, folks, is unusual. How many self-funded candidates have we ever had? How many do we really expect? What's really amazing is that this is the ONE factor that makes everyone question the campaign finance limits, and it happened first time out of the gate. And yet, no one says, "That was unusual." They say, "We should change the entire system!"
Still, I did not really expect that Knox's loss will end the interest in changing the law.
So I was reassured to read, in Bob Warner's story today, that State Sen. Anthony Williams said:
...he will push for prompt Senate action on a bill giving Philadelphia authority to set its own limits on campaign contributions.
"If Tom Knox had won the Democratic nomination, we probably would have had pushback [against the proposed law and contribution limits]," Williams said.
"Now that we know that money influences, but doesn't necessarily buy elections, the measure is probably going to get a lot more favorable treatment," Williams continued. "It's clear that people want to have change."
That's a logical response. Let's see if City Council can keep its wits about it, as well.
Comments (5)
Isn't Fattah's Law suite against the city still pending? And could the supreme court still ultimately strike down our campaign finance authority due to this suit?
Posted by Liz | May 18, 2007 11:49 AM
If you can't cap them all, then don't cap any of them. Nutter passed the law, and it was to his own benefit... Why have such low caps? What if we have another Knox, and he wins? We may not always have a Brady to sack him... Saying that money can't buy an election because it failed to ONCE is crazy... Money DID BUY Knox, a corrupt and politically incompetent hack, 25% of the vote...
Posted by Jim Hionis | May 18, 2007 12:26 PM
If you can get a lot of people to contribute relatively small amounts to your campaign, it shows the depth and intensity of your support among voters. When you get a lot of money from a couple lobbyists, it could mean that you'll win the election based on media visibility, but have very weak support among voters. The limits have forced politicians to work hard and make strong commitments to running for an office (it has even provided an incentive for people not required to resign before running for another office to do so).
Overall, I think the limits have been a success.
Posted by Dave![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://blogs.phillynews.com/dailynews/nextmayor/nav-commenters.gif)
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May 18, 2007 1:04 PM
Overall, I think you are a freaking moron!
Posted by Chaka Fattah | May 18, 2007 3:58 PM
Overall Shocka -you are a creep and segregationist
Posted by Tom Knox | May 18, 2007 4:33 PM