The Best Government Money Can Buy 

In our democracy, every person eligible to vote has the same number of votes as everyone else when they go to the ballot box. Those who are elected run the government. These elected officials meet with the people they represent throughout their term and receive suggestions on how they should improve or change the government. Hypothetically, elected officials must listen to the people they represent if they want to be elected again, because these officials depend on each person’s vote. In a democracy, each person has an equal voice in the political process.  

But in recent elections, there is another dynamic at work. Now, government officials are elected by votes, but those votes are heavily influenced by digital ads, campaign events, and a compelling online presence. This requires massive sums of money. The average cost of winning a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives is now $1.6 million, and winning candidates for the Senate spend on average almost $10.6 million on their elections. The amount of money a candidate raises and spends is directly correlated to their success in their election. The Center for Responsive Politics found that the highest spending candidate wins in 90% of the House races and in 80% of Senate races. This is because candidates who have more money have many advantages over their opponents. They can afford to advertise more, enabling them to make their case more loudly and frequently than other candidates. They can buy the best campaign staff, which is crucial in winning campaigns. Funds also enable candidates to have a larger online presence, to open more offices, do more polls, and travel more. And the rich get richer. The deeper pockets a campaign has, the more it can spend on fundraising activities.  

In 2010, a Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC increased the flow of cash to political campaigns by legalizing the creation of super PACs. Super PACs are private groups of corporations and wealthy people that give unlimited amounts of money to campaigns without disclosing to the public who their donors are. Previously, the Court had upheld certain spending restrictions on corporations and the wealthy due to concerns about government corruption. But in Citizens United the Court reversed its restrictions, allowing corporations and wealthy people to skirt the very laws intended to make our elections fair and honest.

Fourteen years later, super PACs have become so powerful in the U.S. that they outraise the political candidates’ official campaign committees by tens of millions of dollars. Now a majority of political candidates’ campaigns are funded by private corporations and wealthy people. The reliance on donations from corporations and millionaires crosses political divides – more than $1 billion was spent by super PACs for Democrats this election cycle, and more than $1.6 billion was spent by super PACs for Republicans this cycle.⁴ The large and pivotal role that private money now plays in elections means that some people have a lot more power to determine who wins than others, and some candidates have unfair advantages over their opponents. 

The easiest way for wealthy donors and businesses to encourage the government to make the changes they want is to simply help elect candidates who already share their ideology and will work for their interests. But often donors give money to candidates of the opposite party or ideology in the hope that their donations will help sway the politicians towards their concerns. And unfortunately, social scientists have found that once in office an elected official’s campaign donors have significant influence over how they vote on bills, how they distribute government funding, and how they make controversial political decisions. 

As a result, the government in the United States is not just influenced by the will of the people, but also—by the corporations and wealthy people who bankroll our elected representatives. Just as our government would be corrupt if the rich were each given five votes and the rest of us were given one, so too does the ability for certain people to pour millions into a congressional campaign corrupt our government. 

There are some who may believe that this is just the way it works in our democracy.  But it is not. The U.S. is unique in its reliance on private money in campaigns which in turn corrupts our elections and undermines our government. Other major democracies find it absurd to allow corporations and wealthy individuals to dominate the funding of campaigns to elect their most important officials. Some have transitioned to bankrolling campaigns through public funding. Others have invested in free media and implemented strict spending limits on donations.  

In the U.S., these sorts of proposals are more limited. The John Lewis Voting Rights Act includes provisions that encourage small-dollar donations through tax incentives and strengthens disclosure requirements for funders of political ads. A democracy vouchers program is currently being piloted in a few cities across the country as another path towards the public financing of campaigns. This program issues vouchers to every voter which they can donate to political candidates who, in turn, redeem them for public campaign funds. And a few federal and statewide candidates are changing the conversation by refusing corporate PAC funding as a good faith commitment to meaningful campaign finance reform. Finally, voters continue to pass several state-level ballot measures to regulate and enforce the restrictions that were nullified in Citizens United, and state legislatures continue to consider campaign finance reforms. 

Throughout the New Testament, Jesus calls into question the influence of the wealthy over the government. To walk in Jesus’ footsteps is to speak boldly about corruption and the influence of money in politics. While it may take a long time to reclaim our democracy from the grip of monied power, we must chart a path towards a more just tomorrow. The United Church of Christ Office of Public Policy & Advocacy will continue to call for a government that is truly responsive to people, over corporations. We will continue to fight for those struggling to make ends meet and will seek to end the outsized influence of the wealthy in our elections. 

Want to get involved? Contact the UCC Office of Public Policy and Advocacy in Washington D.C.
UCCTakeAction@ucc.org