The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) has filed a federal lawsuit against the Rhode Island Board of Elections seeking to strike down Rhode Island’s campaign finance law. Citing extensively to the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC, the plaintiffs allege Rhode Island law’s definition of a political action committee, its expenditure ban, and its expenditure reporting requirements are all unconstitutional.

The plaintiffs are asking U.S. District Judge Mary Lisi for declaratory judgments clarifying the extent to which state law’s $1,000 contribution limits on contributions by political action committees apply to them. NOM also seeks a declaratory judgment stating they are not subject to the extensive reporting requirements imposed by state law upon entities which make independent expenditures. An in-chambers conference regarding the lawsuit has been scheduled for Thursday, September 30th, 2010.

The Arkansas Ethics Commission has released an opinion against allowing candidates to transfer to their political party any campaign funds unless the candidate is running unopposed or the election is over. This opinion comes at the request of Doyle Webb, chairperson of the Republican Party of Arkansas, after current Democratic Governor Mike Beebe made such a transfer during his 2006 gubernatorial campaign.

Prior to the 2006 election, Beebe transferred $230,000 to the state Democratic Party from his accumulated campaign funds. However, in the opinion the ethics commission stopped short of calling such a transfer “illegal,’ merely stating “the Commission would advise against making such a transfer,” and noted that further facts concerning the situation would need to be determined prior to any determination as to whether such action would violate the campaign finance laws of Arkansas.

Webb noted that no request was made for Governor Beebe to be penalized for the transfer and the opinion was requested primarily for future reference.

The Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) was fined $548,000 by the state Attorney General’s office for violating the state’s campaign finance disclosure law. The fine is for $584,527 in undisclosed funds that went to the campaign against Gov. Christine Gregoire.

Here is the source article: “For Conservative BIAW, a $548,000 Fine,” by Joel Connelly in the Seattle Post Intelligencer on September 24.

Under the new rules, lobbyists are required to report contact with Members of Parliament, Senators and certain staff members affiliated with the Official Opposition.

Additionally, these officials are now subject to Canada’s five-year “revolving door” restrictions forbidding certain officials from becoming lobbyists.

The Museum of the Moving Image: The Living Room Candidate offers over 300 presidential campaign television commercials ranging from 1952 to 2008.

We learned in school what a pivotal moment the Nixon vs. Kennedy televised debate was in shaping the American perceptions of the two candidates, but did you know the first televised presidential campaign ad was for Dwight Eisenhower in 1952? Advertising king Rosser Reeves (of “M&M candies melt in your mouth, not in your hand” fame) put together the famous “You like Ike, I like Ike, everybody likes Ike for president…” jingle.

At the Living Room Candidate, you can sit back and enjoy all the ads: Eisenhower slamming the Democrats in his “Eisenhower Answers America” ad in 1952; the Kennedy, Man for the ’60s jingle, Nixon playing “Happy Birthday” on the piano for Duke Ellington in 1972; Jimmy Carter, “the leader for a change,” glad-handing the crowds in 1976; and Ronald Reagan, “a man whose time has come,” promoting his successes as governor of California in an ad from 1980. Wow, have the styles changed over 58 years!

Video courtesy of the Living Room Candidate.

If you can’t get enough of the Rosser Reeves-era commercials, PBS hosts a wonderful archive called  The :30 Second Candidate. That site hosts all of the campaign ads from the Eisenhower campaign of 1952. You will find a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at how the TV commercials went from concept to script, and from story board to ads.

The Living Room Candidate gives us two quotes to think about:

Democratic candidate Adlai Stevenson said in 1956, “The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal is the ultimate indignity to the democratic process.”

By 1968, television producer and Nixon campaign consultant Roger Ailes said, “Television is no gimmick, and nobody will ever be elected to major office again without presenting themselves well on it.”

Should we add Facebook and Twitter to Ailes’ advice?

Senate Bill 3628, known as the DISCLOSE Act, was reintroduced in the US Senate a second time but failed to garner the 60 votes necessary to be debated on the floor. The motion of cloture vote of 59 to 39 fell along party lines.

A reaction to Citizens United v SEC, the bill includes measures such as requiring organizations to disclose to shareholders, members, or donors information detailing how disbursements were made for campaign-related activity.

The governor of Guam has signed legislation replacing its existing lobbying law with new provisions requiring registration for legislative lobbyists and reporting on the 10th day of the month following the end of a quarter.

The legislation also contains a revolving door provision and penalties for violations of the act.

The Office of the Governor of Guam and the 30th Guam Legislature.

The State Ethics Commission will not enforce contribution limits for committees making expenditures independent of a candidate’s control or consultation. An earlier requested Attorney General’s opinion found a committee engaging exclusively in independent expenditures is not subject to annual contribution limits.

The Attorney General also confirmed the Ethics Commission did not have the power to declare S.C.C. §8-13-1322(A) unconstitutional. The Ethics Commission then issued an Advisory Opinion declaring the Commission would not enforce any contributions limits under S.C.C. §8-13-1322(A) for committees making independent expenditures.

U.S. District Judge Donovan Frank denied a temporary injunction in a lawsuit brought by supporters of Minnesota Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Emmer, upholding a new Minnesota law that revealed political donations from several corporations.  The law was enacted in May after the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United earlier this year freed businesses to spend corporate money on elections, overturning restrictions on corporate political spending in about half the states, including Minnesota.

Minnesota lawmakers responded by enacting disclosure requirements so that corporate campaign spending would be public.  In his decision, Judge Frank explained the public has an interest in knowing who speaks and who pays for campaign messages and advertisements as elections approach.

Photo of Tom Emmer from the Minnesota House of Representatives Web site.

The new regulation, which implements one of the requirements of the ethics reform legislation passed in 2009, would prohibit former employees of state agencies, authorities, and other entities from lobbying their former “governmental body” for one year after leaving their employment with the state.

The meeting will take place at the Ethics Commission offices located at 1 Ashburton Place, 21st floor, in Boston. The meeting will commence at 10 a.m. and is expected to adjourn at 2 p.m.

Under the consent decree signed by Judge George C. Smith, corporations may engage in express advocacy for or against a candidate for Ohio office. Corporations are still prohibited from making direct contributions to a candidate or working with a candidate on these independent expenditures. This order brings Ohio elections into compliance with the January “Citizens United” decision which held corporations have a First Amendment right to make independent expenditures.

The decision may have a major impact on Ohio’s campaign finance regulation because the statute in question contains a clause which states if any section of the law is deemed unconstitutional, the entire law is automatically repealed. A federal court will determine the validity of the remainder of the law next week.

The meeting will take place at the Office of State Ethics, 18-20 Trinity Street in Hartford. The board is scheduled to discuss the feasibility of easing eligibility restrictions of members after it was recently reported an August meeting was forced to be canceled due to lack of quorum. The board is allotted nine positions; however, only six are presently occupied.

After news of the available positions and canceled meeting were reported, officials stated several Connecticut citizens had been in contact with the board about filling a vacancy. Before any new board member can be seated, the individual must first be determined to be a Connecticut voter, have not held or currently hold political office, and have not campaigned for election to political office in the three years preceding the appointment. Further, a board member is not permitted to hold office in any political committee or party, make contributions to state campaigns, be a state employee, be a lobbyist, or be in an organization wherein the purpose is to influence legislation or public agency decisions.

The Oklahoma Ethics Commission has announced it will not enforce a law banning PAC-to-PAC transfers of funds in an instance where one PAC supports or opposes a ballot issue.

The commission recognizes the rule, as written, is unconstitutional because of the U.S. Supreme Court case “First National Bank of Boston v. Belloti”. The ethics commission will likely rewrite the rule in 2011.

A U.S. District Court has invalidated a South Carolina statute defining committees, including those commonly known as PACs. In South Carolina Citizens for Life, Inc. v Krawcheck, the Court found the South Carolina Ethics Act placed significant burdens on groups qualifying as committees without giving meaningful consideration of a group’s major purpose, threatening to chill their First Amendment rights. Specifically, the definition of committee in S.C.C. §8-13-1300(6) could encompass any group, without reference to the entity’s major purpose, and was unconstitutionally overbroad.

Photo of the South Carolina statehouse by Nikopoley on Wikipedia.