Taxation Only with Representation
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TAXATION TAXATION HIS BOOK IS THE FIRST COMPREHENSIVE DISCUSSION TOF CORRUPTION IN CAMPAIGN FINANCE FROM THE TAXATION VIEWPOINT OF A POLITICAL CONSERVATIVE. Liberals have talked about this problem for decades while raising millions of dollars in campaign contributions. ONLY WITH Many politicians who call themselves conservatives have ignored the problem, driving angry voters to support their opponents even ONLY WITH ONLY REPRESENTATION if those opponents don’t propose any solutions at all. In this book, Richard Painter discusses how OUR MONEY-DRIVEN CAMPAIGN SYSTEM UNDERMINES THE VISION OF OUR FOUNDING FATHERS and just about every principle that conservatives believe in. This includes limiting government spending and regulation, upholding traditional values against industries that make money from moral decay, and protecting national security interests against an infl ux of foreign money into US political campaigns. Painter then lays out a plan for reform that conservatives, and REPRESENTATION the Supreme Court, will embrace: defi ning the government’s right to tax its citizens in a way that will give each citizen a real voice in funding campaigns for elected offi ce. In new laws, referendums, and constitutional amendments at the federal or state level, voters need to send a clear message: Americans who have no representation in campaign fi nance can no longer endure taxation by a government in which they have no voice. RICHARD W. PAINTER is a law professor at the University of Minnesota. From 2005 to 2007 Painter was associate counsel to the president and the chief White House ethics lawyer under President George W. Bush. During 2014–2015, Painter was a residential fellow at Harvard University’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, which supported his work on this book. JOHN PUDNER is the executive director of Take Back Our Republic, an organization of conservatives working for campaign fi nance reform. Painter $14.95 ISBN 978-1-939324-12-2 5 1 4 9 5 Richard W. Painter 9 781939 324122 Foreword by John Pudner TAXATION TAXATION HIS BOOK IS THE FIRST COMPREHENSIVE DISCUSSION TOF CORRUPTION IN CAMPAIGN FINANCE FROM THE TAXATION VIEWPOINT OF A POLITICAL CONSERVATIVE. Liberals have talked about this problem for decades while raising millions of dollars in campaign contributions. ONLY WITH Many politicians who call themselves conservatives have ignored the problem, driving angry voters to support their opponents even ONLY WITH ONLY REPRESENTATION if those opponents don’t propose any solutions at all. In this book, Richard Painter discusses how OUR MONEY-DRIVEN CAMPAIGN SYSTEM UNDERMINES THE VISION OF OUR FOUNDING FATHERS and just about every principle that conservatives believe in. This includes limiting government spending and regulation, upholding traditional values against industries that make money from moral decay, and protecting national security interests against an infl ux of foreign money into US political campaigns. Painter then lays out a plan for reform that conservatives, and REPRESENTATION the Supreme Court, will embrace: defi ning the government’s right to tax its citizens in a way that will give each citizen a real voice in funding campaigns for elected offi ce. In new laws, referendums, and constitutional amendments at the federal or state level, voters need to send a clear message: Americans who have no representation in campaign fi nance can no longer endure taxation by a government in which they have no voice. RICHARD W. PAINTER is a law professor at the University of Minnesota. From 2005 to 2007 Painter was associate counsel to the president and the chief White House ethics lawyer under President George W. Bush. During 2014–2015, Painter was a residential fellow at Harvard University’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, which supported his work on this book. JOHN PUDNER is the executive director of Take Back Our Republic, an organization of conservatives working for campaign fi nance reform. Painter $14.95 ISBN 978-1-939324-12-2 5 1 4 9 5 Richard W. Painter 9 781939 324122 Foreword by John Pudner TAXATION ONLY WITH REPRESENTATION Richard W. Painter Foreword by John Pudner 00_2.Taxation.FM_XIV.indd 1 12/18/15 3:20 PM 00_2.Taxation.FM_XIV.indd 2 12/18/15 3:20 PM TAXATION ONLY WITH REPRESENTATION Richard W. Painter Foreword by John Pudner 00_2.Taxation.FM_XIV.indd 3 12/18/15 3:20 PM Taxation Only with Representation: The Conservative Conscience and Campaign Finance Reform Copyright © 2016 by Richard W. Painter All rights reserved Published by Take Back Our Republic Produced by Keen Custom Media (keencommunication.com/keen-custom-media) Printed in the United States of America First edition, first printing Published by: Take Back Our Republic 246 E. Glenn Ave., Ste. B Auburn, AL 36830 www.takeback.org Cover design by Scott McGrew Text design by Annie Long and Steve Jones Charts by Steve Jones Cover image: Bronze Franklin Mint Boston Tea Party Bicentennial 1973 by Kevin Dooley (Chandler, AZ)/Flickr, made available under an Attribution 2.0 Generic license (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ISBN: 978-1-939324-12-2 00_2.Taxation.FM_XIV.indd 4 12/18/15 3:20 PM TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword . viii Preface ............................................xii Acknowledgments . xiv Introduction........................................ 1 Chapter 1: From Magna Carta to McCutcheon: The Controversy over Taxation Without Representation . 15 1215: The 1% Rebel Against Taxation Without Representation ....15 1770s: Americans Rebel Against Taxation Without Representation.......................................21 The Rise of Taxation in the United States ................... 26 The Rise and Decline of Representation in the United States .....27 Congress and the Supreme Court Enter the Fray.............. 30 Elections as a Billion-Dollar Business ...................... 34 Big Labor—Big Money . .37 Distortion of the Electoral Process......................... 40 Distortion of the Legislative Process When Bribery Is Almost Always Impossible to Prove............................ 42 Is It Oligarchy or Is It Even Worse? . .45 The Future of Representative Democracy . 47 Taking Back Our Republic . 49 Chapter 2: The Participation Problem: The Founders’ Vision Betrayed .......................................... 51 Chapter 3: From New Deal to Bad Deal: Big Government in the Era of Big Campaign Finance . 62 Government-Sponsored Enterprises ........................ 64 Taxing and Spending .....................................72 Regulating ............................................ 80 Enforcing ............................................. 82 v 00_2.Taxation.FM_XIV.indd 5 12/18/15 3:20 PM vi Taxation Only with Representation Chapter 4: The Widow’s Mite: Social Conservatives and Campaign Finance . 86 Morality and Money in America: The Founders’ Vision, the Cross of Gold, and the Modern Assault on Natural Law..... 87 Religious Conservatives and Campaign Finance ...............91 Driving the Money Changers from the Temples of Our Democracy .....................................104 Chapter 5: Foreign Campaign Money, US Sovereignty, and National Security Risk . .106 National Security Risk................................... 115 Economic Risk .........................................116 Sovereignty Risk........................................ 117 Political Risk ..........................................118 Conflict of Commitment as a National Security Risk ..........118 Chapter 6: Disenfranchisement at the Top: Why Campaign Finance Hurts the Rich as well as the Poor . 121 The Real Interests of the Top 1% ...........................123 Campaign Finance as a War of Attrition: Trial Lawyers vs . Business and Other Endless Contests among the Rich ......130 Politics as Spectator Sport: The Players and Those Who Watch . 134 The Collective Action Problem ............................143 The Donor’s Dilemma ...................................145 Overcoming the Donor’s Dilemma.........................149 The “Democracy Participation Tax”—a Poll Tax for the Rich....151 Campaign Finance and the Politics of Class Envy .............152 Chapter 7: The Basic Parameters of a Conservative Agenda for Campaign Finance Reform . .154 Efforts to Regulate Political Expenditures Are Probably Futile, and May Be Unconstitutional, but That Is Also Not an Issue Worth Fighting Over ......................155 The Liberal Agenda: POTUS + SCOTUS = Reform ............157 00_2.Taxation.FM_XIV.indd 6 12/18/15 3:20 PM Table of Contents vii Conservatives Will Lose Without a Strategy on Campaign Finance Reform . .158 Transparency about Government—Including Campaign Finance— Is a Conservative Agenda .............................159 America Needs More Speech and More Money in Politics, Not Less ...........................................160 The Supply Side: We Need to Create More Outlets for Electioneering Communications........................162 The Demand Side: More Americans Need to Participate in Making and Paying for Electioneering Communications ....163 Taxation Should Be Conditioned upon a Solution to the Campaign Finance Problem ...........................165 Chapter 8: Taxation Only with Representation . .166 Taxation Only with Representation as a Conservative Approach to Campaign Finance . 173 Implementation of Taxation Only with Representation ........175 Chapter 9: Market Solutions to the Dependency Problem: The Reform Super PAC, Democracy Dollars, Deal with the District, and Other Innovations . 178. The Reform Super PAC ..................................178 Private Sector Democracy Dollars .........................182