Campaign finance effort hurts taxpayers 
By Rob Roper 

On Sept. 5, Vermont taxpayers got stuck with a $1.4 million bill for loser's legal fees in the U.S. Supreme Court case of Randall v. Sorrell. This is the consequence of our Legislature passing a radical, unconstitutional campaign finance law in 1997. It is also a reminder in real numbers why we should be thankful Gov. Douglas vetoed the Legislature's 2007 campaign finance bill.

The driving force behind the unconstitutional 1997 law was the far-left special interest group, VPIRG. Their executive director, Paul Burns, freely admits it was their intention to pick a fight with the Supreme Court. They succeeded by pushing through a law that flagrantly violated our established civil rights. Disturbingly, Attorney General Bill Sorrell went right along with this scheme. As he said in a June 27, 2006, interview with the New York Times, "I know there are free speech issues."

The consequences for you and me and all Vermonters of this irresponsible crusade are healthy doses of insult and injury: our First Amendment rights were purposefully and unfairly restricted for nearly a decade, and now we get to pay a million dollar-plus tab for the privilege of being abused.

How much taxpayer money the Attorney General's Office wasted itself in defending a law that intentionally violated Vermonters' First Amendment rights is still unknown, and Sorrell has, so far, refused to disclose the figures.

The campaign finance bill Gov. Douglas vetoed this year, S.164, (a veto thankfully sustained by all 49 Republican representatives and one Democrat), was also a product of VPIRG. The senator who sponsored the bill, Ed Flanagan (D-Chittenden), is a member of VPIRG's board of directors. Burns personally lobbied the bill through committees.

The new VPIRG bill, like its predecessor, was constitutionally suspect. The ACLU and the lead attorney who argued and won Randall v. Sorrell, James Bopp, both testified that S.164 raised serious constitutional questions and listed them specifically. If it had become law, Vermont would likely find itself in court again. Again, our attorney general would likely lose. Vermont taxpayers would get stuck with another hefty tab. Republicans offered a common-sense solution to Vermont's campaign finance predicament.

Rather than waste time and money crafting a new campaign finance law, why not simply re-pass the laws we had in place before 1997? They stand up to constitutional muster and would not be challenged in court, thus protecting Vermont's rights and taxpayers from another potential legal liability. By re-passing the old law, today's incumbents wouldn't be tempted or given the chance to jigger any new law to benefit themselves or their favorite special interest group. What's more, Vermont ran the 2006 elections under a handshake agreement to abide by the pre 1997 rules with no problems at all. We know they work. All we have to do is make the handshake official, and we're set.

Inexplicably, Democrats rejected this idea, and, despite qualified and credible warnings, recent experience in court, and in defiance of all common sense, passed S.164 anyway. It was wisely vetoed. But now, even more inexplicably, Democrats are threatening to come back in January with essentially the same constitutionally questionable VPIRG bill that failed for so many reasons. Chairwoman of the House Government Operations Committee, Donna Sweaney (D-Windsor) says, Gov. Douglas "can just go ahead and veto it again if that's what he wants to do."

This cavalier attitude in regard to Vermonters' civil rights and hard-earned tax dollars demonstrates just how out of touch the Democrat leadership has become with the needs and priorities of regular folks.

With state government struggling to find funds to fix our roads and bridges, cover deficits in Catamount Health Care and Medicaid, keep up with education costs, and provide some much needed tax relief, voters will have to ask themselves if another taxpayer-funded legal boondoggle on behalf of VPIRG should really be a priority for our legislature at this time.
 

Rob Roper is chairman of the Vermont Republican State Committee. He lives in Stowe.