Calls For A Constitutional Amendment On Campaign Financing

Harvard law professor and political activist Lawrence Lessig, is calling for a constitutional amendment. Lawrence wrote in an article for The Huffington Post

"But in my view, the greatest danger of Citizens United is distraction. There are fundamental problems with America's democracy. An overly diverse speech market is not high on that list. And while the decision in Citizens United -- if things stay as they are -- could create a critical threat to American democracy, that is not because corporations get to speak. The danger in this decision is that it will further cement the corrupting dependency on private funding of public campaigns that already infects our Congress. The problem in our democracy is not diversity; the problem is a Congress dependent upon the fundraisers. The problem is not corporate speech. The problem is the fundraising Congress."

Mr. Lessig has launched a movement called "Call A Convention" which can be found at http://www.callaconvention.org. The organization calls for an amendment with the following:

"1.Congress shall have the power and obligation to protect its own independence, and the independence of the Executive, by assuring, through citizen vouchers or public funding, that the financing of federal elections does not produce any actual or reasonably perceived appearance of dependence, except upon the People.

2.Nothing in this Constitution shall be construed to restrict the power to limit, though
not to ban, campaign expenditures of non-citizens of the United States during the last 60 days before an election.

3.Courts shall defer to factual judgments about an actual or reasonably perceived appearance of dependence when such judgments are made by independent, non-partisan commissions whose Members pledge not to enter elected office for a period of at least 10 years after service on the commission."

This is an interesting twist to the whole campaign finance movement. Lawrence Lessig is also the co-founder of fixcongressfirst.org which is working to enact the Fair Elections now Act.