Testimony of Doris Haddock, of Dublin, N.H., better known as Granny D, before the Kentucky legislature, Jan. 2002

(also see Granny D's Website)

Thank you.

Today our sister and brother citizens believe that their voices in government are drowned out by floods of special-interest money, and they are right. No one seriously argues that point any more. The flood is too great, and the preoccupation of candidates and officials with fund-raising, bully eclipses the interests of everyday constituents. Now with Enron as an example our citizens are beginning to be even more aware of the corruption that is happening in our government, both state and federal. They are appalled at the amounts of money they see being raised and spent on our election campaigns.

In Maine and Arizona, if you can raise a certain number of very small donations from the people who are eligible to vote for you, then you qualify for public funds if you will agree to raise and spend no other money, no special interest money, no fatcat money. In Arizona and Maine, the legislatures are filling with successful candidates who now have no strings of obligation except to the voters who elect them. It is a little system we call a democratic republic, and it is worth trying in every state.

Only the public financing of campaigns provides a dramatic and fundamental correction to the present system. Let us look at the reasons why some may resist this reform.

First, some anti-reformers say that the taxpayers' money should not go to candidates. After all, many of the candidates are people we could never vote for, so why would we want to support their campaigns with our tax dollars? Of course, we support all kinds of people we do not approve of with our tax dollars, starting with out prison budgets. We do not support them; we support a system that provides for a functioning society. Our tax dollars are used to print the names of our political foes on our ballots. Our tax dollars provide for the primary elections of parties we disagree with. We do all of this in the name of democracy. It is an expensive affair. It is the infrastructure of our public decision-making system.

It is like financing our road repairs. Our tax dollars cannot serve our own interests unless they serve the interests of all. So we must not worry that some of our tax dollars go to help candidates we do not agree with. We support them with our tax dollars after they are elected, and we can do so in the election process as well, especially if it means taking the special interests out of the driver's seat.

Financing our elections means financing the good candidates and bad, providing the public with as much information as possible about each candidate and their views, so that we can make a well-formed decision. The expense of getting this information to us is a proper public purpose.

Public interest groups on the left and right _ from the Cato Institute to the Alliance for Democracy _ agree that, for every dollar given to a candidate by a special-interest group, over ten dollars in special tax breaks are given in return. This is nothing less than full public financing, but it is a very expensive system of public financing. By instead directly providing for the expense of campaigns, we can eliminate nine of the ten dollars paid by taxpayers _ those dollars now paid in the form of tax loopholes for special interests.

If you are a political conservative, will you not trade a corrupt system of public financing for a clean one that costs the taxpayers one tenth as much? Is that not the essence of smaller, more efficient government?

And if you are a patriot, would you dare send off your children to war, to bravely defend a system of corrupt special-interest influence? To do so would tear at your heart.

To honor the people who have given their lives in service to democracy, can we not all agree that the present system of organized corruption can and ought to be set aside for a clean money system _ a clean democracy?

In 1864 President Abraham Lincoln warned us against enthroning the corporations or an era of corruption in high places would follow. President Teddy Roosevelt in 1907 stated: _Our government, both state and national, must be freed from the sinister influence or control of special interests. There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short nor an easy task, but it can be done._

Here in Kentucky you surely will attest to what Teddy Roosevelt said that _it will not be an easy task, but it can be done._ It is my understanding of your elections that you already have public financing of the governor's race. Candidates for that office receive $1.8 million in exchange for spending limits, a voluntary law. My congratulations to you for putting this into effect. It is my understanding that it has not been easy, not been perfectly clear of scandals, and that even today there are court cases dealing with past violations of this law.

Now that you are trying to extend the Clean Elections law to other state officers, I urge that you learn from these past violations what needs to be done to tighten your present law and eliminate any loophole that exists.

As you know the Enron affair is only the latest in a very long string of scandals that have discredited the idea that special-interest money can be taken without the corruption of the system. The public no longer doubts that there is corruption in the system.

Because your constituents love this country, they are proud of being a democracy of the people by the people and for the people. They are proud to be the greatest country in the world, and they don't like to believe that there is corruption in their government. They want a government where the men and women of the best skills and the highest character will rise to lead them _ not those who have the most rich friends or who are the best at selling their souls.

You have it in your power to improve government and to honor the many sacrifices that have been made for it. I wish you good success.

Thank you.