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A Miscellany of Poor Approaches
Wednesday, July 14th, 2010
Robert Wechsler
A Poor Approach to Being Ethical
It's great when candidates talk up acting ethically. But it's going too far, and setting a bad precedent, when a candidate takes a lie-detector test in which he says that he never engaged in unethical activities in private- or public-sector work, as reported in the Moultrie (GA) Observer.
The candidate said, “This is truly the first step in restoring the (sense) of trust with the people. Ethics is one of the top priorities (in) fixing the secretary of state office, which is in need of reform in each of its divisions.”
No, I'm sorry, but everyone has engaged in some unethical activity in his or her life. When we take a lie-detector test and say otherwise, we are only fooling ourselves, which is enough to pass. People who can fool themselves into believing they've always acted ethically are not people who can deal responsibly with their ethical quandaries, such as conflicts of interest.
A Poor Approach to Determining Corruption
Yesterday, the federal Second Circuit Court of Appeals came down with its decision in the Green Party of Connecticut v. Garfield case. Much of the decision concerns public campaign financing programs, but there is an interesting and upsetting aspect of the decision that concerns contribution bans.
The court finds the CT statute's ban on contributions from state contractors constitutional, but finds the ban on contributions from state lobbyists unconstitutional. "Although an outright ban on contractor contributions can be justified as a means to address the appearance of corruption caused by Connecticut’s recent corruption scandals, those scandals did not involve lobbyists and thus do not provide sufficient justification for an outright ban on lobbyist contributions."
In other words, preventative campaign finance laws are unconstitutional. No matter how much corruption or perceived corruption attaches to a certain group deeply involved in governments elsewhere and at each level, you have to wait until there is a scandal at your level of government and place before a government can act. This is an odd approach to campaign finance, as well as to anything.
Why couldn't the same approach be taken to specific contractors? If they haven't been caught in a scandal, why shouldn't they be allowed to give any amount of money they want?
It's not as if the government was discriminating against lobbyists. Lobbyists have been at the center of enormous scandals at every level of government. I don't see any reason why, just as government officials sacrifice some freedoms when they choose to serve, lobbyists who choose to become deeply involved in the democratic process should also sacrifice some freedoms in order to make it clear to the public that their expenditures of often large amounts of money (spent on lawyers and other staff) to get what they want from government officials is all that they will spend on this goal.
A Poor Argument Against an Investigation
Last November I wrote about an unusual suit against the Montgomery County (MD) ethics commission on the grounds of discrimination in its investigation against a transgendered council aide on account of her gender identity. A new or updated version of the complaint was filed in May, and besides seeking $1 million in economic damages and $4 million for emotional distress, it contains a couple new twists.
The aide and her council member both refused to answer interrogatories from the EC regarding legislative activities on the basis of "legislative privilege," and the aide refused to answer interrogatories about her personal activities, including apparently her telling people that they could not petition for removal of the gender identity discrimination law (see You Tube of what she said), because the interrogatories "implicated her First Amendment rights of free speech." (pp. 7-8 of complaint)
It does appear strange that the aide was asked about the gender identity discrimination law itself, because it doesn't seem relevant to what happened. There appears to have been no need to prove the aide worked on the bill in order to show that she harassed people petitioning against it. Seeking unnecessary information about legislative activity is a great way to cause local legislators and their aides to use the legislative immunity defense.
As for a first amendment free speech defense, that's a new one on me. One can make this defense against the charges (although the You Tube video shows that her words were more command than opinion), but not to an investigation of the charges.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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It's great when candidates talk up acting ethically. But it's going too far, and setting a bad precedent, when a candidate takes a lie-detector test in which he says that he never engaged in unethical activities in private- or public-sector work, as reported in the Moultrie (GA) Observer.
The candidate said, “This is truly the first step in restoring the (sense) of trust with the people. Ethics is one of the top priorities (in) fixing the secretary of state office, which is in need of reform in each of its divisions.”
No, I'm sorry, but everyone has engaged in some unethical activity in his or her life. When we take a lie-detector test and say otherwise, we are only fooling ourselves, which is enough to pass. People who can fool themselves into believing they've always acted ethically are not people who can deal responsibly with their ethical quandaries, such as conflicts of interest.
A Poor Approach to Determining Corruption
Yesterday, the federal Second Circuit Court of Appeals came down with its decision in the Green Party of Connecticut v. Garfield case. Much of the decision concerns public campaign financing programs, but there is an interesting and upsetting aspect of the decision that concerns contribution bans.
The court finds the CT statute's ban on contributions from state contractors constitutional, but finds the ban on contributions from state lobbyists unconstitutional. "Although an outright ban on contractor contributions can be justified as a means to address the appearance of corruption caused by Connecticut’s recent corruption scandals, those scandals did not involve lobbyists and thus do not provide sufficient justification for an outright ban on lobbyist contributions."
In other words, preventative campaign finance laws are unconstitutional. No matter how much corruption or perceived corruption attaches to a certain group deeply involved in governments elsewhere and at each level, you have to wait until there is a scandal at your level of government and place before a government can act. This is an odd approach to campaign finance, as well as to anything.
Why couldn't the same approach be taken to specific contractors? If they haven't been caught in a scandal, why shouldn't they be allowed to give any amount of money they want?
It's not as if the government was discriminating against lobbyists. Lobbyists have been at the center of enormous scandals at every level of government. I don't see any reason why, just as government officials sacrifice some freedoms when they choose to serve, lobbyists who choose to become deeply involved in the democratic process should also sacrifice some freedoms in order to make it clear to the public that their expenditures of often large amounts of money (spent on lawyers and other staff) to get what they want from government officials is all that they will spend on this goal.
A Poor Argument Against an Investigation
Last November I wrote about an unusual suit against the Montgomery County (MD) ethics commission on the grounds of discrimination in its investigation against a transgendered council aide on account of her gender identity. A new or updated version of the complaint was filed in May, and besides seeking $1 million in economic damages and $4 million for emotional distress, it contains a couple new twists.
The aide and her council member both refused to answer interrogatories from the EC regarding legislative activities on the basis of "legislative privilege," and the aide refused to answer interrogatories about her personal activities, including apparently her telling people that they could not petition for removal of the gender identity discrimination law (see You Tube of what she said), because the interrogatories "implicated her First Amendment rights of free speech." (pp. 7-8 of complaint)
It does appear strange that the aide was asked about the gender identity discrimination law itself, because it doesn't seem relevant to what happened. There appears to have been no need to prove the aide worked on the bill in order to show that she harassed people petitioning against it. Seeking unnecessary information about legislative activity is a great way to cause local legislators and their aides to use the legislative immunity defense.
As for a first amendment free speech defense, that's a new one on me. One can make this defense against the charges (although the You Tube video shows that her words were more command than opinion), but not to an investigation of the charges.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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