STATE OF THE STATE

How far can we go in policing
the conduct of public officials?

by Jennifer Davis

For some experts, ethics reform is the same thing as campaign finance reform,

Sure, the holiday season is over. Still, you'd think Illinoisans could hang on to some of that better-to-give- than-to-receive spirit. Apparently not. At least not in Illinois politics. A glance at newspaper headlines across the state shows some public officials prefer the getting over the giving.

For those who are still groggy from too many New Year's Eve toasts, here are the highlights:

• The feds recently charged Chicago Aid. Rafael "Ray" Frias with bribery. Even his own lawyer admits that in 1994, while Frias was serving in the state legislature, he took $500 to help a waste hauler get special interest legislation through the General Assembly. Unfortunately for Frias, the waste hauler was a government mole, and the alderman got scooped up in the Silver Shovel probe.

To his credit, some would argue, Frias rebuffed other outright bribes. Instead, prosecutors said, Frias, who had dreams of going to Congress, solicited $25, 000 for his campaign kitty. Prosecutors alleged there were strings attached to that cash.

But jurors decided Frias had been trapped by the feds. They acquitted him in mid-December.

• In Springfield, meanwhile, federal prosecutors continued to press another bribery investigation, this one involving a politically connected state contractor and a lengthening list of state workers. In the capital city, appropriately, that investigation goes by a less poetic, more bureaucratic moniker: MSI. Since last summer, trials have snagged two co-owners of Management Services of Illinois Inc. and two state employees. Under the scheme, MSI gave cash, gifts, meals, trips and campaign contributions in return for a lucrative, renegotiated state contract paying the computer company $7 million more for the same work.

James Berger, on leave as deputy director of the Illinois Department of Public Aid, has been accused of taking part. His trial was still underway in mid-December. So far, he's the highest state official to be charged, but the feds have implied the influence peddling reaches higher.

Public Aid Director Robert Wright has already stepped down, saying he had become "the subject of continuing controversy." The announcement came shortly after MSI was convicted, along with co-owner Michael Martin and former Public Aid administrator Ronald Lowder, who oversaw the contract.

So is this simply a rude reminder after our merry holidays that Illinois is, yet again, awash in scandal? After all, the year may be new, but the news isn't.

Illinois has a long history of corruption. Take the late Secretary of State Paul Powell. Fond of sending poinsettias to seniors during the holidays, he was one Democratic official known for giving. But Powell was also known for getting. He collected $800, 000 in a shoe box that was found in his Springfield hotel room after he died in 1970. Some alleged Powell had accepted bribes during a political career that included a stint as speaker of the House. But that was never proven. At the time, no one had to keep track of cash gifts or campaign contributions.

That much has changed. And, ever since moles and wires have become de rigueur in federal investigations, bribing lawmakers to pass or kill legislation has become a dicier proposition. Indeed, for the most part, ethics have improved over the decades. And, this being the season of hope, we might put faith in public pressure during an election year to spur further change.

We still have a long way to go. In contrast to most other states, Illinois has no limits on what special interest groups can donate to candidates. And we're the largest state that has yet to tackle ethics reform, according to the Council on Governmental Ethics Laws, a Los Angeles-based educational organization devoted to studying the subject.

And what is ethics reform? For some experts, it's the same thing as campaign finance reform.

"Ninety percent, no, I'd say practically 100 percent of everything having to do with legislative ethics involves money," says George Beam, the University of Illinois at Chicago's expert on ethics in government.

In the past couple of years, other states, including California, South Carolina, Kentucky and Maine, have attempted to regulate the flow of money. Maine passed "perhaps the most far-reaching reform," according

6 / January 1998 Illinois Issues

to research by the Council of State Governments. That state's Clean Election Act created a voluntary system of public financing for state legislative and gubernatorial campaigns — one all candidates can use if they raise qualifying funds from voters, then agree not to take more private money. California voters approved a measure allowing candidates who agree to spending limits to accept twice as much money as those who don't.

Such reforms are often the result of scandal. Several years ago in Kentucky, a former House speaker, two lawmakers and five former lawmakers were convicted on extortion and racketeering charges that prompted sweeping reforms in campaign finance and lobbyist laws, according to State Legislatures magazine.

No such luck in Illinois.

Jim Howard tells a funny story about that. Howard, executive director of the reform group, Common Cause of Illinois, recalls talking with the head of the West Virginia ethics commission about possibilities for reform.

"He tells me I need to wait until a legislator is indicted to galvanize public opinion. I tell him, 'This is what I'm up against: We had three out of four convictions in a federal corruption trial this summer involving one of the governor's campaign contributors. We just had one representative and our tollway director, a good friend of the governor's, convicted in a corrupt land deal and another representative who was just indicted on another matter who is going forward with his re-election campaign.' He looks at me, stunned, and says, 'I can't help you.'"

Well, Illinois officials don't want help. They like things the way they are.

Another part of the problem, Beam believes, is that everyone has his or her own idea on just what ethics is. "Philosophers have written scores of books on the subject." We could accomplish more change, he argues, if we just called most ethical lapses what they really are: campaign finance problems.

The problem is that everyone has his or her own idea on just what ethics is.

However, Alan Rosenthal, a recognized expert on legislative ethics nationwide, paints a broader picture of ethical conduct. "The 'corruption' of legislators by campaign contributions, gifts, and perquisites fits into the subtle category of what is unethical," he writes in a recent book, Drawing the Line: Legislative Ethics in the States. "It is the in-between terrain that causes difficulty."

For example, should public officials use their campaign cash for personal items, say a house or a Porsche? That has happened, and is legal, in Illinois.

Former state comptroller, state senator and gubernatorial candidate Dawn Clark Netsch added to that list in a recent opinion piece. She asked, for instance, whether public officials should have to disclose a spouse's financial interests.

"Sounds right," she writes in a December issue of Cram's Chicago Business. "But in this age of dual- profession families, is it fair, or even necessary, to deny privacy rights to an unsuspecting husband or wife who happens to be married to a politician?"

It may seem that, outside of blatant misbehavior, the mention of ethics leads to questions, rather than answers. We return to Beam's argument that policy-makers need to refocus the issue.

"Today, we call any problem an 'ethical' problem. For instance, patronage. It used to be just patronage. Now, it's an ethical problem. Same thing with campaign finance. If it's an issue of money buying influence, then deal with that. I think we get too wrapped up in defining what is 'ethical.'"

Perhaps. But even if we agree the vast majority of ethical questions can be filed under campaign finance reform, let's not forget the real reason Illinois is the last large state clutching the status quo: It benefits those in power.

While the rest of the nation has been adopting stricter campaign finance laws, Illinois struggles to pass even the most minor reforms. Last year, campaign finance recommendations issued by the Illinois Campaign Finance Project were largely ignored. The report detailed skyrocketing campaign contributions by special interest groups. (Gambling interests, for example, upped their contributions 20-fold in just four years.) Among the suggested changes: limiting contributions from groups, corporations, associations and individuals to $2, 000 in the primary and $2, 000 in the general election; restricting total giving by individuals and political committees to $200, 000 per election; and restricting transfers to candidates from political parties and legislative leader committees to $25, 000 in the primary and $25, 000 in the general election.

Lofty goals to be sure, especially for a state that hasn't seen significant campaign finance reform in more than 20 years. So, no surprise, only two minor recommendations squeaked into law last spring. One eliminates the so-called D-3 form, which asks people examining campaign reports for their name, address, phone number, occupation and reason for looking.

The other measure will put campaign financial reports on the World Wide Web.

Stronger proposals to cap contributions and ban personal use of campaign funds went nowhere. Still, Illinois could — and many argue that it should — make significant changes in this area. Other states have. We still cling to laws so weak that it's no wonder voters are increasingly disenchanted with our political system, experts say. That disillusionment is why the subject of ethics keeps coming up.

But when we decide to define the issue more broadly, we stumble, Beam, Rosenthal and Netsch agree. We don't know what we want. We just know we want something we can believe will keep public officials in line. The problem, according to Rosenthal: You can't legislate that. Ethics laws can't guarantee ethical behavior.

As Netsch concluded, "Guidelines cannot reset the moral compass of every elected official."

Illinois Issues January 1998 / 7