The reform debate about the political parties is getting stuck on the question of whether, or to what extent, deregulation will improve the tone and ideological cast of national politics.  Some have argued that relieving parties of this or that restriction will alleviate pressures toward polarization and perhaps promote more centrist, moderate politics, in large measure by giving party leaders more influence.  There is some evidence for this, but it is naturally being disputed in a fight between the “purists” who resists deregulation and the “pragmatists” who favor it, and neither side to this debate is likely to score a decisive victory.  So if there can be no clear outcome, there is every reason to hope that not too much is riding on one.

When one day it has more or less run its course, the scholarship will likely show the party leaders with more money at their disposal can use it for better and for worse.  In some cases they will have the will and the means to check the extremes and expand their capacity to negotiate with opponents and move productive legislation. In others, this will not be the case.  Which of these alternative scenarios comes to pass in any state, in any time, will depend on a range of factors, including differences in states and regions and their politics, differences between the parties, the complexities of what is sometimes called the "issue environment,” and other factors.  As Lee Drutman has noted, “polarization is a function of many, many things,” and campaign finance may be only one such thing.

Before all these questions is another one: the difficulty of pinning down what one means by centrist or moderate politics, or even by a civil tone (notwithstanding some contemporary, notable examples of grotesque excess).  And another question: whether the moderate position is in all circumstances the most desirable one, if the policy described as “moderate” is just a product of splitting the difference.  The policies born of getting something done just for its own sake are not always distinguished by their effectiveness.

It is a better bet – – and a bet it is – that some of the time, empowered party leadership with stronger parties behind them can better perform their jobs. Right now they compete for their political influence with candidates who can build their own fundraising bases, and with outside groups (some of which, like Super PACs and (c) organizations, can be indistinguishable from the rest of a candidate’s, well, “support network.”).  To put parties at a disadvantage in this transformed political battlefield should require sound, well-supported policy justification.  Four years now, the justification has fallen entirely on the parties’ supposed role in fomenting corruption, the result of their (once) unique intimacy with candidates.

In a thoughtful article, Michael Kang of Emory has taken on the question of whether de-regulated political parties, taking in larger sums of money, can truly act as a bulwark against polarization—or only as yet another agent of the wealthy and their policy preferences.  He doubts donors would expect from parties any less responsiveness or gratitude. If the committed class of large donors is ideologically polarized, it is hard for him to see how party officials could resist its demands and retain the freedom to move party politics toward the center, closer to the ground for compromise.

This is one aspect of the normative case against party de-regulation he would put up against views presented by Rick Pildes, among others. (He has other concerns: for example, that "even if de-regulation of party campaign finance assigns the right balance of power among party actors, it neglects distributional equality concerns that were once a main focus of campaign finance policymaking."  Kang, Michael S., The Brave New World of Party Campaign Finance Law (2015). Cornell Law Review, Vol. 101, 2016; Emory Legal Studies Research Paper No. 15-365, at 57. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2674406.)

On this question of the direction into which parties would be pushed by the larger donors, Professor Kang gives a fairly straightforward picture of the donor and her motivation, and of the relationship of donor to party official.  The donors on this account will give only on conditions; the party officials, to get the money, will meet them.  The well-to-do donors do not have multiple motives: their demands, at least as the party official would interpret them, are of the “all or nothing” kind.  Is this a fully satisfactory account?

California has approved rules to better keep Super PACs in line.  The Fair Political Practices Commission has its eyes on the federal and other states’ election law controversies, noting in a press release that it is acting “on the heels of a national trend toward increased coordination between candidates and Independent Expenditure (IR) committees—a trend the FPPC seeks to stop.”  It wishes to enforce the “highest degree of separation that is constitutionally permissible “ to counter “new strategies being used by outside groups.”  Memorandum from Jack Woodside and Hyla Wagner, to Chair Remke and Commissioners, “Independent Expenditures: Adoption of Amendments to Regulation 18225.7” (October 5, 2015), at 3, 4.

The FPPC regulations already use “rebuttable presumptions” to identify the factual circumstances in which coordination is present or where there is good reason to suspect it. It has also provided for some exceptions—“safe harbors”-- for certain contacts between candidates and the IE committee.  In the revised rules approved last week, the FPPC adds to the presumptions and to the safe harbors.

As soon as the New York Times reported again this week on the concentrated wealth flowing through Super PACs, leading election law experts on the listserv began disputing what to make of the story.  Was the spending independent “speech” that the Constitution protects? Or was it no different than massive contributions not to be confused with direct speech and as such properly regulated?

The exchange over doctrine replayed familiar themes.  A key one: could the donors who have given to a Super PACs be fairly said to be engaged in their “own” speech?

Fred Wertheimer remains indignant about Citizens United and he certainly comes by this view honestly.  He has been strongly for campaign finance regulation since the 1970s and had a hand in lobbying its successful passage in the first place.  It is not surprising that he is very distressed by the watered-down definition of corruption articulated by the Court first in Citizens United and then with more clarity and emphasis in the “we-mean-what-we-said” restatement in McCutcheon.

Wertheimer says in this new piece what he has said before about “legalized bribery” being the product of the Court’s fecklessness and naiveté.  This charge is familiar, and some object that it is tired and unproductive, but Wertheimer adds to this complaint another: that the decision unleashed “political chaos”.