Policy Digest

December 1996 - February 1997 

Motor Voter Fraud

The nation's 1993 motor-voter law -- which made it much easier for would-be voters to register -- is coming under attack for opening the door wider to possible fraud. The law allows applicants for driver's licenses to register at the time of their tests at state motor vehicle offices.

  • Critics note that many states do not require proof of identification to register -- only a signature on a card.
  • Once registered, a voter can request an absentee ballot -- which does not require an appearance at a polling place.
  • As a result of these lax procedures, multi-state voting, fake registrations and repeat voting by an individual in the same election are becoming problems.

In Chicago, 150,000 voters registered more than once, with 90,000 registering three or more times. Thousands of mentally handicapped voters were assisted in registering in Illinois.

Louisiana state Rep. Louis "Woody" Jenkins charges that 2,600 "phantom voters" and 10,000 more questionable ballots were cast in his U.S. Senate race -- which he lost by 5,788 votes.

Mississippi is now the only state resisting motor-voter registrations, contending that the federal government has overstepped its bounds by interfering in state elections. The Supreme Court has agreed to hear Mississippi's case.

Source: Jeff A. Taylor, "Does Motor-Voter Equal Fraud?" Investor's Business Daily, December 24, 1996.

Public Health Undermined by Politics

Public health services in the U.S. are being politicized, according to some active in this field. Illnesses are the result of economic systems -- namely, capitalism -- rather than disease and other phenomena to be combated by scientific inquiry and treatment. A recent forum brought this attitude to light.

  • The American Public Health Association chose as its keynote speaker for its annual scientific meeting last month the president of the AFL-CIO -- whose message was: "help us rejuvenate the labor movement."
  • The official theme of the conference was "Empowering the Disadvantaged: Social Justice in Public Health."
  • One speaker made the case for radical redistribution of wealth, claimed illness was caused by a power imbalance in capitalist society, and called on her listeners to "counteract the free market with social programs."
  • A Harvard epidemiologist lamented the "dismantling of social programs by the supporters of corporate America."

Along similar lines, a professor at Harvard's School of Public Health reportedly described how she and her students at a class she teaches, "Race and Racism," spend weeks exchanging experiences of being discriminated against and exploring their own racist tendencies.

Those who are concerned with this trend warn that the American Public Health Association runs the risk of becoming irrelevant, since its activist leadership is out of touch with its members.

Source: Sally Satel, "The Politicization of Public Health," Wall Street Journal, December 12, 1996.

Reform Enforcement in Washington State

There is no lack of campaign-finance reform ideas in Washington, D. C., but a case in Washington state demonstrates that enforcement of whatever laws are on the books may be just as important as the form the law takes.

  • Since 1994, the state has had a law aimed at full disclosure of campaign donations.

  • The powerful Washington Education Association -- a teachers' union which is the state branch of the National Education Association -- was found to have "seriously" broken the law after an investigation by the state's Public Disclosure Commission.

  • The violation -- said to be the largest of campaign law in state history -- prompted the commission to find the group so political that "the question of whether the WEA itself constitutes a PAC (political action committee) needs further investigation."

  • The commission asked the state's attorney general to prosecute -- but she is said to be under heavy pressure from big labor to go easy.

She will reportedly announce her plans by the end of January.

The violation occurred after fewer than 20 percent of WEA members agreed to political dues being siphoned from their paychecks. So union leaders set up a new fund which they claimed was exempt from requirements that they disclose to members that they were docking their pay for political action purposes. The new fund began to pull in more than $700,000 a year from teachers' paychecks.

Teachers were suspicious and asked the disclosure commission to investigate. When the commission failed to respond, they contacted the Evergreen Freedom Foundation for help. The foundation's president plowed through WEA data and found more than $4 million in WEA campaign spending violations.

Source: Peggy Jackson (Evergreen Freedom Foundation), "Enforcement: The Real Campaign-Reform Trick," Investor's Business Daily, January 22, 1997.

Dangers of Reform

Almost no one likes the often-abused, hypocrisy-riddled system of campaign finance. But some observers are worried that current suggestions for reform would make the system even worse. The plans include expenditure limits, regulated access to broadcast media and some form of government funding. The potential problems are daunting.

  • Anyone who gets a party's nomination would have equal access to money and airtime, even for a racist, anti-social message -- funded by taxpayers.

  • So-called "equalization" formulas in federal campaign underwriting have a decidedly pro-incumbent tilt.

  • Reformers want to counter the "free" airtime which incumbents naturally have by mandating equal time for challengers -- despite the fact that the Supreme Court overruled such "balance" when it threw out the Fairness Doctrine.

What reformers neglect to take into consideration, skeptics warn, is that if the electoral playing field is leveled, legislators will resort to their ultimate weapon to win favor with voters: pork. If they can't talk their way into voters' hearts, they'll spend their way in.

Source: Tony Snow (nationally syndicated column), "Campaign Finance: Cure is Worse than the Disease," Dallas Morning News, February 4, 1997.