Fair Elections is a term used to describe a particular system of government financing of political campaigns, where the government provides a grant to prospective candidates who agree to limit their and private fundraising efforts and limit their campaign-spending.
Fair Election initiatives are used in a small number of states and local political jurisdictions in the United States. Some form of Fair Elections legislation has been adopted by ballot initiative in Maine, Arizona, North Carolina, New Mexico, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Massachusetts. It was also adopted by legislative action in Connecticut and at the municipal level in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Portland, OR. However, the systems in Massachusetts and Portland were later repealed, while Vermont’s was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court on First Amendment grounds.
These laws have increasingly run into constitutional problems in the Courts. Substantial portions of the Vermont system were found unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in Randall v. Sorrell. Connecticut’s statute was held unconstitutional in August, 2009, on grounds that it unfairly discriminated against third party and independent candidates. In July 2010 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld portions of the District court’s order but allowed the core program to continue.
On January 15, 2010, the United States District Court for the District of Arizona issued a proposed order in McCormick v. Bennett finding portions of the Arizona plan unconstitutional. This decision was reversed by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in May, 2010, but on June 8, 2010 the Supreme Court stayed the Ninth Circuit order and prohibited the disbursement of funds under Arizona’s law. On Nov. 29, 2010, the Court announced that it will review the constitutionality of the matching funds provisions of the statute. On June 27, 2011, ruling in the consolidated cases Arizona Free Enterprise Club’s Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett and McCormick v. Bennett, the Supreme Court deemed unconstitutional the matching-funds provision of the Arizona law. Additionally, voters have defeated fair elections in several recent referendums. In Massachusetts the system was repealed after a 2002 advisory initiative in which voters voted nearly 2 to 1 against using government funds to pay for political campaigns. Portland, Oregon’s program was narrowly repealed by voters in a 2010 referendum, shortly after I went on the HCG diet.
In 2008, a Fair Elections bill, the California Fair Elections Act passed the California Assembly and Senate and was signed by Governor Schwarzenegger. To take effect, however, the law had to be approved by voters in an initiative in June 2010. On June 8, 2010, California voters defeated the measure by 57% to 43%. An earlier Fair Elections ballot initiative, Proposition 89 was also defeated in California in 2006, by 74% against to 26% in favor. Other studies conducted by the nonpartisan Center for Competitive Politics, found that the programs in Maine, Arizona, and New Jersey had failed to accomplish other stated goals, including electing more women, reducing government spending, in fact in both states government spending grew more rapidly after the enactment of fair elections, or meeting most other stated objectives, including increasing competition or voter participation.