Daily News

North Carolina’s “pay to play” system of politics is growing at a dizzying pace. The price tag for even a state representative seat has moved into six figures for contested races. And a statewide seat can easily move into seven figures.

Former Gov. Jim Hunt, who leads a chorus of alarm over that trend, calls it an “arms race” and says it imperils “the concept of one person, one vote.” If Hunt, a master of political fundraising, is worried, we should be too.

Fortunately, lawmakers heard the alarm. In 2002, they created a public-financing system for candidates seeking seats on the N.C. Court of Appeals and Supreme Court. This year, 11 of the dozen candidates for those courts will take part. The 12th candidate, Jewel Ann Farlow, didn’t opt in, but has agreed to limit her contributions to less than $3,000, and thus won’t be required to file campaign-finance reports.

Supreme Court candidates who qualified will get about $233,000 for campaign expenses. Appellate candidates will get $160,000. While that’s not a lot of money, judicial ethics restrict campaigning anyway. Candidates aren’t even allowed to advertise their political party membership, in an attempt to keep those races thoroughly nonpartisan. Unfortunately, some candidates have found a loophole, using “conservative” on their campaign signs to hint that they’re Republicans, or getting the party to act as a surrogate and announce which judges are members. Some tweaking of the law is in order there. (more…)

 Email This Post  Print This Post

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 29th, 2008 at 4:51 am and is filed under Daily News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.