Campaign Spending

"The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic State itself. " — FDR The corporate stranglehold on media, elections and congressional bill-drafting has locked our economy into obsolete and unproductive channels. Corporate influence has even led the Supreme Court to rule this year that corporations are "persons" with "rights. " The court's bizarre logic shows just how precarious our democracy and our economy have become.

Following his primary victory last month, Charles I. Ecker, the Republican nominee for county executive, raised $25,033, to increase his campaign war chest by 61 percent.That's his good news.His bad news is that during that same period, Democratic incumbent M.Elizabeth Bobo raised almost twice as much -- $43,681.Not only that, but included in Ecker's total is another $5,000 he has lent himself. He has advanced his campaign $20,000 since January -- nearly one-third of the $66,345 he has raised altogether.

REMEMBER that famous handshake between President Clinton and House Speaker Newt Gingrich pledging campaign finance reform during the 104th Congress? Well, forget it. The Senate yesterday killed any prospect for action this year amid the usual vows that reform will come -- well past the November election.Congress once again is proving it cannot deal with the tough issues. When it comes to closing military bases, putting caps on Social Security and Medicare spending or, in this instance, terminating outrageous financial practices that undermine the integrity of the political process, the legislative branch can't legislate.

CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM suffered its second body blow in as many days last week when the Supreme Court ruled that political parties can spend as much as they like in congressional races so long as they act "independently" of actual candidates.This could open the door wider to the vast sums of money flooding into the political process. It put the court ever closer to the view that First Amendment protection of free speech may, in the end, block efforts to limit the power of well-financed special interests.

The state's political corruption prosecutor will not step down in September as planned, but will instead remain in office until a replacement is named. In a harshly worded letter written this month, State Prosecutor Robert A. Rohrbaugh said he was "disappointed" that Gov. Martin O'Malley had not moved more swiftly to convene a commission required by state law to help select his successor. Rohrbaugh posted the letter on his website Monday morning. "It is important that this state have an independent prosecutor who is not an elected politician," Rohrbaugh wrote.

HAVRE de GRACE -- Everybody except perhaps his lawyers seems to agree that Joe De Francis, the racetrack mogul, did a bad thing. He persuaded three relatives to contribute $4,000 each -- under Maryland law, the legal maximum an individual can give to a candidate -- to Governor Glendening's election campaign in 1994. That in itself was OK, but then he reimbursed the contributors, and now he faces misdemeanor charges of exceeding the limits on campaign contributions.There has been a chorus of clucking over the incident, some of it from the governor, who says he is shocked and intends to give the money back.

Here in media world, we're all quite cross at The New York Times and its former star reporter, Judith Miller. She is widely believed to have sought her martyrdom as a career move. And then she gave up after a mere couple of months in jail. What a wuss! And the Times: this great institution let a mere reporter lead it around by its nose, with predictable results. What a superwuss! But this latest blow to the reputation of the mainstream media cannot be pinned on Ms. Miller or the Times.

WASHINGTON -- Time and maneuvering room may be running out for House Speaker Newt Gingrich and sidekick Dick Armey in their thinly veiled continuing effort to stall campaign finance reform into oblivion.Backed into a corner by increasingly restless reformers of both parties in the House, the Republican leaders have agreed to bring the issue to the House floor tomorrow for a single day of airing. Then, after disposing of certain appropriations bills, consideration of campaign finance reform is to resume under a pledge from Mr. Armey, the House majority leader, to bring the issue up for a vote before the August recess.

WASHINGTON -- A case on campaign spending by political parties, just heard by the Supreme Court, has reformers worried that a concept called ''express advocacy'' could provide a major loophole for avoiding long-established federal limits.The concept, invoked by the Colorado Republican Party to justify exceeding a federal spending limit for a Senate race, holds that an unlimited amount of money can be spent as long as it is not used to expressly advocate the election or defeat of a candidate.

WASHINGTON -- Frustrating a carefully planned effort to get constitutional clearance for ceilings on campaign spending, the Supreme Court refused yesterday to reconsider its view that money spent on politics is a form of speech fully protected by the First Amendment.Without comment, the court turned down a case from Cincinnati that campaign finance reformers pushed through the courts as a full-scale attack on a 1976 Supreme Court ruling declaring that it is unconstitutional to place "a ceiling on expenditures for political expression."