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In this chapter of Life after Reform: When Bipartisan Campaign Reform Meets Politics, the author traces the odyssey Congress traveled to produce the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) as an overview of the diverse policy views, & the difficulties of resolving the many substantive concerns of campaign finance reform. Diverse policy preferences & the debates are contextualized in the contentious political environment that limited coalition building due to tensions between differing perspectives on problem definition, partisan interests, constitutional imperatives & parliamentary procedure. The evolution of the partisan debate on soft monies & labor union spending issues surrounding the McCain Feingold bill are traced through the 106th & 107th Congresses & eventual signing by President Bush. The author concludes that debates about campaign finance reform remain because the debate originates in the various determinates of the behavior of political donors that lead to diverse policy preferences. 1 Table. J. Harwell

Early experience with federal campaign finance reform suggests that the new law is fulfilling its primary objective of severing links between policymakers and large donors, and thus reducing the potential for corruption in the political process. Instead of languishing or seeking to circumvent the law, the national political parties have responded to the ban on soft money by increasing their hard money resources. While outside groups appear active, particularly on the Democratic side, their soft money financing should remain a small fraction of what candidates and parties will raise and spend in the 2004 Elections.

Early experience with federal campaign finance reform suggests that the new law is fulfilling its primary objective of severing links between policymakers & large donors, & thus reducing the potential for corruption in the political process. Instead of languishing or seeking to circumvent the law, the national political parties have responded to the ban on soft money by increasing their hard money resources. While outside groups appear active, particularly on the Democratic side, their soft money financing should remain a small fraction of what candidates & parties will raise & spend in the 2004 elections. Adapted from the source document.

In this chapter of Life after Reform: When Bipartisan Campaign Reform Meets Politics, the authors address the impact of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) on presidential politics to predict that the law will generate two tiers of candidates & increase the importance of the "invisible army" of pre-campaign fundraising. The problems of soft money & front loading are discussed in the context of public financing created by the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA). The choice by presidential candidates to opt out of the public finance system in favor of reliance on outside money is discussed. The authors analyze three scenarios of the impacts of BCRA had existed in the 2000 primary elections to argue that BCRA will strengthen incentives against use of the public finance system by presidential candidates. 2 Tables, 4 Figures. J. Harwell