The SPEAKER pro tempore. Mr. PAUL of Texas is recognized for 5 minutes.
1998 Ron Paul 64:1
Mr. PAUL.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In recent
months there’s been a lot of discussion
on the House floor dealing with
campaign finance reform.
1998 Ron Paul 64:2
I’ve spoken out on this issue, and
once again I want to make some comments
about how I see this problem
and what we might do about it. Also I
want to mention an amendment that I
will be bringing up.
1998 Ron Paul 64:3
I suspect we will be talking about
campaign finance reform for a couple
more months. I see this somewhat differently
some others. Others see that
all we have to do is regulate the money
and we’re going to solve all our problems. But all governments are prone to
be influenced by special interests. That’s the nature of government.
1998 Ron Paul 64:4
So the smaller government that you
have, the less influence you have and
the less effort there is made to influence
the government. But when you
have a big government, there will be a
lot of people and a lot of groups that
will want to influence government, and
that’s where I see the problem.
1998 Ron Paul 64:5
Twenty-five years ago in the 1970s,
after Watergate, the Congress wrote a
lot of rules and regulations. Hundreds
of candidates have filled out forms and
have done all kinds of things that have
been very complicated but have
achieved very little. The problem is
every bit as bad as it was before, and
most people admit that.
1998 Ron Paul 64:6
And I think there’s a good reason for
that. It’s that they were addressing the symptoms
rather than the cause. And the
cause is, of course, that big government
is involved in every aspect of our
lives, our personal lives, our economic
lives, and also around the world, influencing
almost every government in the
world. So not only is there an incentive
for business people to come here to influence
our government, but there’
labor groups that come to influence
our government. We have international
groups and other governments coming
to influence us. And until that is settled,
we can rest assured that we will
continue to have these problems.
1998 Ron Paul 64:7
But there’s another problem that I
want to address, and that is the decreased
interest in campaigns and elections. Thirty years ago we would have
30 some percent of the people would
turn out in the primary elections.
1998 Ron Paul 64:8
Today it’s less than 20 percent. And it’s a
steady decline. There is good reason for
this because as government gets bigger
and as money becomes more influential,
and money talks, the little people
who have their desires and their voices
unheard and want it to be heard, they
feel very frustrated. So it is understandable
and expected that there will
be lower and lower turnouts in our elections. And that is exactly what is happening.
1998 Ron Paul 64:9
Now, why is this the case? Is it just
because they are apathetic? I don’t
think so. I think a lot of people make
wise choices and say it does not make
a lot of difference; my vote does not
really count because so much money is
influencing what happens in Washington and
with legislation. And yet we have
rules and laws throughout the country
that make it just about impossible for
anybody outside the ordinary two-party
system to be represented.
1998 Ron Paul 64:10
Twenty percent of the people don’t
bother registering because of the frustration,
20 percent of the people who do
register, register as Independents. So
that leaves about 60 percent of the vote
split between Republicans and Democrats,
each getting 30 percent. They’re
a minority. The people who are really
shortchanged are the majority, that 40
percent who feel unrepresented and
very frustrated about the situation.
1998 Ron Paul 64:11
How does this come about? It just
happens that Republicans and Democrats
tend to control every legislative
body in the country, every State legislative
body. And, therefore, they write
rules and regulations and have high
fees for people getting on ballots, and
you don’t have any competition. And
there is lack of interest, and there is a
lot of frustration.
1998 Ron Paul 64:12
Take, for instance, some of the
groups that have tried in the past to
get on and become known but are frustrated
by all these rules. There are
Independents, Socialists, Greens, Taxpayers
Party, Populists, Libertarians,
Constitutionalists, Reform Party, Natural
Party, American Party, Liberal
Party, Conservative Party, Right to
Life, Citizens Party, New Alliance
Party, Prohibition Party, States
Rights Party. All these people have
been totally frustrated because they
have so many obstacles put in their
way by requirement of huge numbers
of signatures on ballots.
1998 Ron Paul 64:13
I would like to quote from Richard
Winger, who writes a letter called the
Ballot Access News. He cites one of the
worst examples. He says Florida now
requires 242,000 valid signatures to get
a minor party or Independent candidate
on the ballot of any State-wide
office other than President. Only one
signature is permitted on each petition
sheet. And he goes on. And the payment
that is required is $8,250.
1998 Ron Paul 64:14
This is what needs to be changed. I
have an amendment to the bill that
will change this. I hope all my colleagues
will pay attention to it.
Notes:
1998 Ron Paul Chapter 64
Ron Paul also speaks on campaign finance reform
in 1998 Ron Paul Chapter 59.
1998 Ron Paul 64:3 I see this differently some others. perhaps should have been I see this differently from some others.
1998 Ron Paul 64:8 There is good reason for this because as government gets bigger and as money becomes
more influential, and money talks, the little people who have their desires and their
voices unheard and want to be heard, they feel very frustrated.They is redundant.
1998 Ron Paul 64:10 The people who are really shortchanged are the majority, that 40 percent who feel unrepresented and very frustrated about the situation.
40 percent is a plurality, not a majority.
