Smith thinks that reform legislation has created a new inequality for candidates that, if left unchecked, threatens to destroy the American electoral process by obliterating the foundational principle of free speech. He argues that "money buys speech" and when candidates lack money to buy media time and space they are effectively silenced. Their inability to "speak freely" violates the most significant intentions of our nation’s founders: that a sovereign citizenry elect its own leaders based on a free exchange of ideas. For Smith, campaign finance reform has unwittingly unbalanced the checks and balances created by the Framers of the Constitution.
After presenting a detailed historical overview of how we have reached the present crisis, Smith proposes a simple solution: institute a process that completely discloses relevant information about campaign donors and recipients of donations. All disclosures would be available to the media, which would be able to investigate and report them fully. Only then, Smith believes, will the United States have the opportunity to be the democratic republic that its founders intended.
AUTHOR BIO: A certified public accountant, Rodney A. Smith is a political consultant and fund-raiser. In the past thirty years, he has raised over a billion dollars for candidates and political committees. He has been the national finance director for the Republican National Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee and served as treasurer and finance director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. He is the only finance professional ever honored as the "Most Valuable Player in a Campaign" by the American Association of Political Consultants. He lives in Washington, D.C.
