Some people always seem to know exactly why they got into politics.
Take Larry Hicks, who used to be a Democratic state legislator from Mount Vernon. Hicks got the lobbyists and lawyers and unions to give money to his election campaigns. Then he used the money to go on vacations in the Bahamas and Mexico, buy nice clothes, and lease a sleek Porsche 911 Targa.
Hicks thought this was all part of the job, and I suppose he might have had a case. It’s possible that as he tooled around the homeless shelters and unemployment offices of his southern Illinois district in his Porsche 911 Targa, downtrodden constituents might have been inspired to think that someday they, too, could be a politician, and somebody else would pay for their clothes and vacations and car.
I thought Hicks was the best, until Greg Zito came along. Zito used to be a Democratic state senator from Melrose Park, and he had the lobbyists and doctors and corporate folks filling up his campaign fund. He borrowed more than $250,000 of that money and used some of it to build a beautiful home for himself in DuPage County.
Who knows, maybe Zito also had a public purpose in mind. He might have turned a floor of his home over for low-income housing, which DuPage County needs. I don’t think he did that, though.
Not that Hicks or Zito had to do anything noble to justify spending campaign funds on clothes and cars and houses.
There’s nothing in state law that says it’s illegal to collect money from the lobbyists for your campaign fund, and then use it on anything your little heart desires.
Nope, nothing in the law said that Roland Burris couldn’t borrow $28,200 from his campaign fund when he was Illinois attorney general, and use it to sweeten his state pension. Burris put the money into the pension system, and that let him qualify for 85 percent of his salary when he left office. Otherwise, he would have had to scrape along on 65 percent.
Now, you’d think that the politicians who aren’t buying cars and houses with the money lobbyists give to them might get annoyed about letting the other politicians do it.
After all, it’s a little unseemly. You write the laws for the state. You collect money from the lawyers and doctors and unions and businesses that have a big interest in how those laws are written. And you spend the money on cars and clothes and houses.
Maybe, just maybe, the politicians are finally ready to change that. The House and Senate are supposed to vote today on a bill to make it illegal.
It has a real chance of becoming law. It was crafted by two fine people, former Democratic Sen. Paul Simon and Mike Lawrence, the former press secretary to Republican Gov. Jim Edgar. They run the Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University.
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It has sponsors from both parties and each part of the state: Sen. Kirk Dillard (R-Hinsdale), Sen. Barack Obama (D-Chicago), Rep. Gary Hannig (D-Litchfield) and Rep. Jack Kubik (R-LaGrange Park.)
The bill would make it against the law to use campaign money for personal benefit, like buying houses and cars.
The bill would make it against the law for state officials to accept gifts from lobbyists and people who do business with the state. If the legislators are still embarrassed over the MSI scandal, in which legislators and some of Gov. Jim Edgar’s aides were showered with gifts from a company that was scamming the state, here’s their answer.
The bill would make it easier to figure out who is funneling money into the political campaigns. People who donate more than $500 would have to disclose where they work and what they do.
The bill would get serious about breaking the law. A violation of a disclosure law would carry a $5,000 to $10,000 fine.
Best thing is, the lawmakers have no excuse not to pass this bill. It skips the whole debate over whether to put limits on how much anyone can give to a campaign, how much any candidate can spend on a campaign. It wouldn’t give an edge to the unions, it wouldn’t give an edge to business, it wouldn’t run afoul of the 1st Amendment.
It would simply declare that from now on when you get a campaign contribution, the only thing you can spend it on is a campaign.
I think it could pass, but I cringe when I say that.
When it comes to campaign reform law, politicians are notorious for pulling one over on the public. For a few years, the favorite gambit in Washington was to have the House pass a high-minded campaign reform bill, and the Senate pass a high-minded (but different) reform bill, and to make sure that neither chamber touched the other’s work. That way, the reform votes made it into the campaign brochures, but not into law. In Springfield, they usually just ignored the whole thing.
Maybe this time they won’t. Maybe the MSI scandal, the embarrassment of Porsches and houses and retirement bennies, and a solid bill that has backing in both parties, will get something done.
But it’s hardly guaranteed. The bill is supposed to be in good shape in the Senate, but a little shaky in the House. So it might be a good idea to call somebody in Springfield today. Give them some encouragement.
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