Lobbyist Caps Cause Corrupiton? Not Quite

A few weeks ago, state Representative Lynn Smith (R – Newnan) spoke at length about lobbyists, influence, and the need for ethics reform after newspapers called attention to the fact that she had asked for sponsors to buy dinner for the state House Natural Resources and Environment Committee held at Parish Foods & Goods, depicted above. Lobbyists, of course, leapt at the chance to wine and dine member of the Committee. But according to Rep. Smith, lobbyists simply have no influence on her, as she bases her legislative decisions on information from a wide range of sources.

Rep. Smith further explains in the Times-Herald article that ethics reforms such as caps on lobbyist gifts aren’t needed because, “the states that have done that tend to have less transparency and openness… there are ways around things like that.” An opinion article from the AJC agrees. Both cite a 2010 study by The Daily Beast on The Most Corrupt States as evidence, particularly the case of Tennessee, which in 2006 was the center of a huge legislative bribery scandal, Operation Tennessee Waltz.

That sure sounds like some pretty irrefutable proof. But is it really? A closer look at the study, which opponents of ethics reforms are holding up as the reason why lobbyist caps are a terrible idea, suddenly makes the whole situation much more complicated.

First we have to look at what they mean when they say they’re talking about corruption. The Daily Beast study divides corruption into several categories, including public corruption, racketeering and extortion, forgery and counterfeiting, fraud, and embezzlement. All of these categories use government statistics of one sort or another to track a 10- or 11-year period of arrests or convictions for crimes that would fit in each group.

This is where we run into our first problem. Of all of these categories, public corruption is the only category that takes into account under-the-table lobbyists gifts, but even this isn’t an exact fit, since it only refers to “convictions of elected and other public officials investigated by federal agents.” There’s a whole lot that’s left out—cases that didn’t get convictions because of technicalities or because the case hadn’t finished yet, cases that were handled on the state or local level instead of the federal, cases that were breaches of ethics and evidenced corruption but might not have technically been illegal.

And of course, these other categories that don’t really apply to what everyone who’s pushing for ethics reform is talking about muddy the picture. Tennessee may be the #1 most corrupt state overall, but in public corruption they’re actually ranked #18.

Let’s look at Tennessee more specifically because even though it’s public corruption rank is higher than the overall corruption rank, being #18 isn’t a much better distinction. How can we claim lobbyist caps are effective when they just lead to scandals like the one in Tennessee?

Hold on a second. Tennessee passed their current lobbyist restrictions after the scandal, in response to what had happened. When Operation Tennessee Waltz occurred, ethics laws in our neighboring state were completely different. Saying that their lobbyist caps caused the ethics scandal is completely false. And since Operation Tennessee Waltz is included in the data collected for the Daily Beast study, claiming that Tennessee is so horribly corrupt because of its current ethics laws doesn’t make sense. You’d have to look at corruption both before and after the new law and compare them to make the judgment of whether or not those sort of lobbyist caps lead to corruption, not simply lump everything all together.

When it comes right down to it though, Georgia is 1 of only 3 states that don’t have lobbyist caps of one sort or another. Saying that lobbyist caps lead to increased corruptions should mean that Georgia is one of the least corrupt states, and yet we aren’t (#11 overall and #38 in public corruption, keeping in mind the caveats discussed before). In the end, what might be more important is what type of lobbyist caps are in place. Neither of the proposed bills in the Senate or House are outright banning all lobbyist gifts but rather setting reasonable limits. This won’t drive lobbying activity underground, just regulate it to a reasonable level.

It’s entirely possible that these new ethics reform laws could have unintended consequences—pretty much every law does. But that’s not a reason to not pass an otherwise great law. It is reason to debate the law, to do serious investigations and not just take studies like the one done by The Daily Beast at face value so that Georgians get the best possible ethics reform package. Maybe our legislators are all moral paragons, but ethic reform legislation takes away the possibility of temptation. It actually makes their jobs easier, and gives Georgia’s citizens confidence that their legislators aren’t being unduly influenced by lobbyist largess. With lobbyist caps, everybody wins. So sign our petition supporting ethics reform legislation and contact your legislators and leaders in the House and Senate to let them know you expect them to pass ethics reform. Ethics reform isn’t about harming anyone but instead about helping everyone.

Written by: CCGA Social Media Associate, Kari Storla