Campaign Finance Reforms - Essay Example

of the History and Political Science of the Concerned 26 March Campaign Finance Reforms More of campaign finance reforms are really necessary for the American democracy. Campaign Finance reforms help reduces the role of money in the political system within the nation. Hence, campaign finance reforms are must because they are the only way to assure that the country has elections that are free and fair and the political system in the country do not gets manipulated by vested interests. The United States of America has a political system in which the political contestants finance their political campaigns with their money and the money that is contributed or collected by their supporters.

Campaign finance reforms have always been an aspect of the American democracy that has generated much public reaction. In the year 1971 the US Congress brought into existence the Federal Election Campaign Act (Schier 128). The purpose of this Act was to make campaign finance transparent. This was followed by a prolonged period of silence and restraint in this area. In the year 2002 the need for introducing reforms in campaign finance surfaced again. This led to the coming into existence of Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (Nielsen 43).

This Act assured that the private donors are not able to donate such money to the political parties and political contestants that is not legally regulated by the Federal Election Commission. This was indeed a big step towards reforming campaign finance. Still, there were some aspects of this reform that happened to be controversial in a legal context (Nielsen 43). This led to a Supreme Court ruling in the year 2010 in the famous Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission case, which declared this act to be unconstitutional (Nielsen 59).

This Supreme Court verdict once again increased the role played by the corporate money in the American democracy. Thereby this verdict has generated much public disapproval. This has indeed increased the need for more campaign finance reforms. It is a known fact that collecting campaign finance is a task that takes much time and attention of the Congress men. This diverts their attention from the real issues faced by the country. The politicians are greatly dependent on the private donors for campaign finance.

Thereby, this increases the clout of the corporate and private donors in the American political system (Schier 41). It is plain commonsense that the need for campaign finance makes the political contestants dependent on corporate donors. This increases the power of the corporate donors to make the political contestants follow their political agenda, once they come into power (Nielsen 160). Thereby, there is a great need for more campaign finance reforms. There is a need to make campaign donations more transparent.

In the current times advertising and PR play a big role in political campaigning. Hence, the political contestants who can have more campaign finance are more likely to generate much public interest. This sidelines the political contestants who have true leadership abilities, but less of the campaign finance. Unregulated campaign finance could manipulate the system at many levels. It could subvert the political system by manipulating it with the help of money. Big money could help those candidates succeed that are more favorable towards the corporate intentions (Cillizza 1).

There are available facts to prove this. For instance, as per a research conducted by Center of public integrity, the corporate donors donated contributed large sums of money to many social organizations and bodies capable of influencing political campaigns (Cillizza 1). This shows that the corporations can influence elections with the help of money. If one thinks of the future, the campaign finance reforms could be expected to go slow. Such reforms will be opposed by the corporate donors. Besides, a section of the politicians could also be expected to oppose campaign finance reforms.

Still, effective campaign finance reforms are necessary to make the political campaigning in the nation more people oriented and democratic. It is the time to rescue the political campaigning from the influence of big money. If a major aspect of the democracy in the nation that is electioneering is left vulnerable to big money, it could readily lead to unwanted and evil consequences. Hence, campaign finance reforms are the need of the hour. Works Cited Cillizza, Chris. “Here’s 185 Million Reasons Campaign Finance Reform Hasn’t Worked”.

The Washington Post 17 January 2014. Web. 26 March 2014. Nielsen, Rasmus Kleis. Ground Wars. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012. Print. Schier, Steven E. You Call this an Election? America’s Peculiar Democracy. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2003. Print.