Posted on: Saturday, May 19, 2001

Editorial
On campaign reform, it's the same old tricks

Next time you read or hear that Congress is determined to do something serious about campaign finance abuse, take the news with a grain of salt.

The latest evidence that there is no sincere effort to change things comes from a slick trick attempted by Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott.

To the pleasure of spending reformists, Lott said earlier this year that the GOP majority would not use parliamentary devices to block legislation as it has in the past. Well, they were as good as their word and a bill that would effectively end the soft-money system as we know it passed the Senate.

But earlier this week Lott's colleagues discovered he made an end-run around such plans. He simply refused to send the bill on to the House. If he had succeeded in this effort, a full-scale conference would have been impossible to avoid.

But after this maneuver was discovered, Lott's colleagues rose up and approved a "sense of the Senate" resolution ordering Lott to send the measure to the House without delay. It passed 61 to 36.

Clearly, leadership is out of step with the majority on this issue. It is time to end the corrupting influence of the fat-cat, soft-money system.