Christopher Dodd

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I now suggest a period of, say, 15 minutes for general discussion on an agreement that has been reached between Senator Thompson and Senator Feinstein. On the purpose of that discussion, why don't I yield to Senator Thompson of Tennessee to begin the discussion and then Senator Feinstein as time permits, as far as this agreement, or others who may want to talk about it. My hope would then be we would have legislative language which would include this compromise which we would be able to offer as a modification of the Thompson amendment, and a vote to occur thereon shortly after the debate is concluded.

Mr. DODD. No. We are just going to proceed in this regard.

Mr. DODD. As my colleague spoke, an angel brought it. The modification has arrived. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DODD. To save a little time, if my colleague would yield, Mr. President, I have been looking at a couple drafting notes from legislative counsel. I have spoken on numerous occasions over the last several days of my concerns of raising the hard dollar limits that individuals may contribute on the theory that I do not think there is too little money in politics, on the contrary, I think there is too much money. We are shutting down the door of soft money. Fine, as it should be. However, my concern is that we are also banging open the back door with hard dollars amounts. To the average citizen in this country, there is no distinction between hard and soft money. We make the distinction for the reasons we are all aware of. What I believe is people are sort of disgusted with the volume and amount of money in politics. This agreement is one I am going to support. I do so reluctantly. However, I support the underlying McCain-Feingold bill. I think it is very important that we take steps forward to change the present campaign finance system. I regret we are adding to the hard dollar limits on contributions that individuals can make to candidates, national political parties, and overall aggregate annual limit. I come from a small State. I represent a State of 3.5 million people. My colleague from California represents a State 10 times that size. I recognize that there are distinctions between these States. For example, campaigning is far more costly in California than it is in a State such as my own. I accept there needs to be some increase. The modification Senator Thompson graciously worked out with Senator Feinstein exceeds what I would do. It is certainly less than what was offered by our colleague from Nebraska, Senator Hagel. It was less than what others wanted as well. It reduces substantially the aggregate amounts that were originally being offered at $75,000 per year or $150,000 a couple, down to $37,500 per calendar year. That still is too much, in my view, but it is a lot less than it otherwise could have been. There are some other changes dealing with individual contributions to State and local party committees and the national parties. However, the PAC limits remained the same. We provided indexing for inflation. Again, this is something I have reservations about. I recognize that in any legislative body, if you are trying to put together a bill where 100 different people have something to say about it, and you have to produce 51 votes, then you are going to have to give up something if you are going to accomplish the overall goal. My overall goal has been for years to get McCain-Feingold adopted into law. However, it was not a goal I was going to accept regardless of what was in the bill. Had we gone beyond these individual contribution limits we had agreed to in these modifications, I would have had a very difficult time supporting the McCain-Feingold bill. I will support McCain-Feingold. I urge my colleagues to do so. We have other amendments to address on both sides. The Members have ideas they want to add to this bill. In my view, this is a worthwhile effort. I commend my colleague from Tennessee--he is a noble warrior, a good fighter and debater, and a good negotiator--and our colleague from California who likewise has championed a good cause. I thank Russ Feingold and John McCain. I know this goes beyond even what they would like to do. We recognize we can't do everything exactly as we would like to do it. I believe this modification still is within the realm of the McCain-Feingold restrictions. For those reasons, I will support the bill. Amendment No. 149, As Modified

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I don't know of any other requests to speak. I think people are familiar with this issue. Does my colleague from California wish to be heard?

Mr. DODD. I am prepared to yield back our time and go to a vote. We have other amendments on this side. There are several over there. We have to keep things going.

Mr. DODD. We yield back our time.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, again on the wings of angels, the Senator from New York has arrived.

Mr. DODD. Yes. If I may, Mr. President, let me respond to my colleague from Kentucky by saying that this amendment has been debated and discussed. The Senator from New York has, I know, at on least three different occasions explained this amendment and the value of it. I think we have had a pretty good debate. I recommend to my friend and colleague from Kentucky that we have a vote on or in relationship to the Schumer amendment at 5:20. I believe there is a meeting for some of our colleagues at the White House at around 5:30. My hope would be we might have this vote before that meeting occurred. That would give those who would like to be heard on this amendment some time to come to the floor and to express their views on this.

Mr. DODD. We can do that. I will try to accommodate you on that. The message has gone out. Why don't I take a few minutes myself. Certainly my colleague from New York should have 5 minutes or so to respond to some of the arguments made. Let me say in relation to this amendment, the Senator from New York, as he has done characteristically throughout his public career-- certainly as long as I have known him as a Member of the other body and as a new Member of this body--has literally discovered, in a sense, what could be the new soft money loophole if we do not deal with this. I say to my colleagues, for those who care about McCain-Feingold, care about what we are trying to do on soft money, as almost every legal expert in the country who is knowledgeable about campaign finance laws has predicted will be the Supreme Court decision in the Colorado case II. The section 441(a)(d) coordinated expenditure limits will be held unconstitutional by a majority of the Supreme Court in the Colorado II case. The practical results is that when spending limits on the national parties are removed from the hard dollar cap, then the parties can contribute to Federal candidates, directly or indirectly, with unlimited sums of money. If I have misspoken here, my colleague from New York will correct me. I believe this summarizes the sum and substance we believe is about to happen. If, of course, the Supreme Court goes the other way and rule the section 441(a)(d) limits constitutional, then this amendment has no effect. But if the coordinated spending limits are overturned, as the Senator from New York has predicted, and as others have suggested, we will not be obligated to return to this subject matter. Knowing how painful it is to spend as many days as we have already talking about campaign finance issues, it could well be another 25 years before we would come back to this subject matter. In the meantime, we could have a Supreme Court decision that would blow open the doors for hard money, or the new soft money loophole, having spent all these days working to shut down the existing soft money loophole and limiting the hard dollar contributions in order to slow down the money chase. Let me quickly add, again, I voted for the Thompson modified amendment. I did so reluctantly. I disagree with the notion that we had to increase these hard dollar limits of individual contributors by as much as the Thompson modification allowed. Now to reject the Schumer amendment, and by doing so allow unlimited hard dollar contributions would fly right in the face of everything a majority of us have spent the last 10 days working to accomplish. We have improved, in my view, the McCain-Feingold bill. It is a better bill in many ways than it was when it came to the floor a week and a half ago. If we now reject this amendment, in light of what is clearly going to happen in the court, we will undo much of what we have done, not only over this past week and a half, but what Senator McCain and Senator Feingold have achieved, along with those of us who have sponsored or cosponsored their efforts over the past several years. So I urge my colleagues to take a close look at this. Try to understand what the Senator from New York is saying here. He is saying if, in fact, the coordinated party expenditure limits are ruled unconstitutional, then we need to provide a voluntary mechanism for how such limitations may be dealt with. He does it in a way that tracks the two Supreme Court decisions in the Colorado Republican cases and on first amendment issues very successfully. Having read these decisions carefully, he has now crafted a proposal that is directly in sync with these decisions, including the projected decision in Colorado II, where nexus has to occur between the activities and there is no mandatory requirement attached. While I am not an expert in this area of the constitution, but based on what I have read, if you meet the two criteria I suggested, then your proposal can pass constitutional muster. I think it is our collective judgment to move forward in this area. Last week we passed an amendment that would prohibit millionaires from running against us incumbents. We allowed the hard dollar contributions to immediately go up if someone out there challenges us. If the challenger suggests he or she might spend half a million dollars of their own money against us, then the trigger threshold comes into play. I voted against it because I thought it was a ludicrous amendment. But, if you felt comfortable that amendment was adopted and you are protected from the personal wealth of challengers, then don't start breathing a sigh of relief now. The millionaire amendment is here. I would pause before I would enjoy the sense of security. If this amendment is rejected, then you could face million-dollar contributions going to your opponent if, in fact, the Supreme Court does what many think it will do, and strike down the spending limits. So, again, whether you are a proponent or opponent of McCain- Feingold, I think you ought to support this amendment. None of us here--nor any challenger--should face the possibility of watching almost unlimited contributions come through national or State parties to fund these races without any restrictions at all. Particularly after a majority of us--a significant majority of us--believe there should be some limitations, some slowing down of a process here the amount of money is getting out of hand. With that, Mr. President, I see my colleague from Michigan who has been eloquent on this subject matter and understands it almost as well as the Senator from New York and certainly far more than the Senator from Connecticut. So I would be happy to yield to him 2 or 3 minutes to correct any mistakes I may have made in describing what this amendment does and how it works.

Mr. DODD. Does my colleague from Kentucky wish to be heard?

Mr. DODD. I think the Senator from New York wants 2 minutes to wrap up before the vote.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, the proponents of the amendment are prepared to yield back the remainder of our time.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the Schumer amendment.

Mr. DODD. I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. DODD. What is the pending business?

Mr. DODD. On our side, I know the opponents have a request for about 20 minutes. I don't know if the Senator from Ohio is prepared to accept a time agreement so we know when the next amendment might occur.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, in response to my friends and colleague from Kentucky, I have 21 amendments. Now, we all have been down this road in the past. How many of those will actually be offered--I know around 12 at this juncture. I have asked the authors of these amendments how serious they are, and I would say around 12 or 13 feel very adamant. They may not need much time. We don't necessarily need 3 hours as the bill requires or allows. We are constantly working, trying to see if we can't get this number down. We have a list. We are prepared to go with several amendments. I have Senator Bingaman with amendments ready; Senator Durbin has amendments ready; Senator Harkin has amendments ready. We are prepared to move along based on the schedule the leadership wants to endorse.

Mr. DODD. I am for that.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I yield 6 or 7 minutes to my colleague from Vermont in opposition to the DeWine amendment.

Christopher Dodd

Speeches

Manage analytics