Jed Pickett
Corporate Contributions to Political Campaigns
Craig Allen
SOC 120 Introduction to Ethics and Social Responsibility
January 7, 2013

The recent election has got the blood boiling of many voters. Corporate contributions have become a major problem in the United States and affected and have affected many elections. I would like to discuss how money and greed can affect the decision of any candidate and cause them to betray their own personal beliefs and cause the betrayal to the people that they represent. I will also look at the issue using classical ethical and contemporary ethical theories, as well as looking at the issue through the view of utilitarianism. Any corporation should not be able make any contribution towards a campaign because then their ideas could become the candidates ideas even if a candidates is strongly against a subject that the corporation supports. We are going to look at the issue from the point of view of utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is a classical form of ethics that I will use to look at this issue. First off utilitarianism is described in our text book as a natural way to see if an act is the right thing to do or the wrong thing to do is to look at the consequences or the results of that action. (Mosser 2010) Looking at corporate contributions and seeing the type of candidates that the American people are being offered I believe that the corporations should not be allowed to contribute to a campaign. I do not see a problem, however, if an individual wants to contribute to the campaign of a preferred candidate as long as they contribute under their name and not the corporation name. Greed is something that grabs ahold of a person and does not let go until they have hit rock bottom. Many companies sell certain products that contribute to a situation that a certain candidate does not believe is right or does not believe in at all, one such topic being abortion. For example, we have a company that provides the medication or the equipment for abortion clinics to be able to provide the service that they perform, one candidate feels very strongly about abortions and is strongly against it, the company could go to the opposing candidate and say for small nominal donation towards your campaign will you campaign pro-abortion. If they candidate is running low on the funds that he or she needs to be able to run their campaign they could accept and just throw their beliefs and feelings about the subject out the door just because the company gave them money to support their run for office. A corporation would see this as an investment if that candidate wins because then they know they would not do away with abortion for the time they are in office and the company can continue to turn a profit selling their product. The utilitarianism point of view I believe is the best view point on this subject because with any logical view on the elections anyone can see that the corporation in America provide a lot of the support towards a certain style of politics whether it be conservative or liberal. The news corporations have to be the biggest political influence of any election. I can imagine that they not only donate substantial amounts of money towards campaigns but they are also given the rights to publish certain stories and tweak the information so it sounds pro towards one candidate but completely trashes the other candidate. A hard task to do would be to keep the media out of an election. The monetary power of a corporation is severely underestimated by most voters and they do not pay attention to what a candidate truly believes instead they focus on what is broadcasted by the media corporations and what they are told to say by the corporations that contribute to the campaigns.
We should also be looking at the reasoning behind why corporations give so much money and support to certain candidates and the bigger reasoning would be to look at what the corporations gain from the candidate or even the political party being elected or having the majority in either the Senate or in Congress. I believe that be looking at the reason that a corporation contributes to a political campaign we can then clearly see the consequence that the contribution could have on the government. The biggest reason that comes to my head is they have an idea that they want pushed to the American people or the candidate strongly supports the type of services that they provide and will insure that their business will not fail and if they come to the point of bankruptcy they will be bailed out by the federal government. From any point of view that you look at this subject money seems to be at the very center. I believe it is the main reason any company provides a contribution to campaign. As I stated before they see it as an investment to insure their business will continue on a good path to prosperity. Deontology evaluates whether or not an act is wrong base doff of the consequences of that act and based off of the consequences that we can see happening in our government today I believe that corporations giving to political campaigns is wrong. (Mosser 2010) The book also talks about a universal rule test which looks at the situation from every angle and describes if from everyone in involved would this action be the right thing to do? We should be looking at the point of view from the CEO’s of the corporations, from the employees and from the candidates whom they are supporting. We should be looking at the situation from all angles and see does this contribution benefit just my company or is it going to benefit just the corporate managers and CEO’s, and ultimately is it going to benefit the American people?
Looking at the issue from a contemporary ethics point of view I am going to look at the issue using virtue ethics. What virtue ethics does is it looks at the character of the person performing the act. When deciding who to contribute money to the values and beliefs of a person are very important because this could very well be the person who is elected and will carry this values and ethics with them to the Senate, Congress or other area of political office from which they will be serving the people of their state or their country. I believe that in today’s time this is something that we should focus more on when electing any person to public office. Their actions and character should speak for them rather than what they promise to do for the American people. When CEO’s or corporations make the decisions to contribute a political campaign and offer services in exchange for support I do not believe that they look at the whole person concept and look at what the candidate has accomplished and the character and feelings on certain issues. They feel that if they throw enough money at the candidate that they can persuade them to change their views and provide support for them. Eventually the corporations will push for funding from the government for research or other projects saving the corporations millions of dollars in their own money. What it will lead to is a candidate that does not speak for themselves, use their beliefs to make decisions, or freely support any organization or idea that is outside of the beliefs of the corporation. Instead they will become a puppet to the corporations that control the money supporting their campaigns and giving them the services and funding the lavish lifestyle to which many of the politicians have become accustomed.
Corporations can use candidates that they contribute to appeal to a variety of different classes of people throughout the United States. They can use the power to influence the candidate to promote their business and essentially focus on different races, religious groups, and variety of different wealth classes. If we look at politics today we can see that many of the politicians have a stake in the green energy market and that has been a very big topic of controversy over the past few years. In certain cases it is not that the corporation is providing funding for campaigning but that the politician has stock and therefore has a financial stake in the corporation so they want them to do well in order to make more money and increase the profitability of the company. Corporations have also used their monetary power to persuade candidates of certain areas that they see fit to better expand their business. This can cause the collapse of many locally owned businesses because they are being forced to compete with a major corporation. Politics today has turned into a battle of who can pay the most money to support me and whoever does I believe whatever they believe. Corporations for the most part are the driving force of the economy of the United States. Looking from their point view and using the tools that I have been given to logically make an opinion on whether they should be allowed to contribute towards political campaigns I would say no they should be able as a corporation to support a certain candidate or campaign. Making a contribution as an individual says “I like this candidate and I strongly support what they believe and how they would run the country”. When you make a contribution as a corporation you have a company name on a check for a candidate and that name is representing every employee that is employed by the company and is a statement that says “everyone that works for this company supports what you do and what you have to say”. Not everyone that works for the company could have the same political views. For it truly to be a campaign about the issues the corporations should not be able to provide any kind of assistance towards a certain candidate but rather they should make that choice as an individual and exercise their first amendment rights to do so. I believe the founding fathers of this country had the idea that anyone serving in any public position was to serve the people of the country and represent them and make decisions based on the will of the people. In today’s world it has become very easy for corporations to spend millions of dollars in donations to influence the thoughts and beliefs of political candidates. Again going back to virtue ethics I believe that we would stand a better chance of electing people who would better serve the people and the country if the beliefs of the corporations were not pushed onto the politicians and there was no monetary gain involved to influence their minds. Another important part that I believe influences corporations to from contributing millions more for political campaigns is that they are not allowed to claim the contributions as a tax deduction when it comes time to file taxes at the beginning of every year. I believe that this helps to influence the amount of money given. However, I do believe that there are under the table monetary gifts given to political campaigns by corporations that are under the table donations. There have been several attempts made to regulate the amount of corporate contributions to political campaigns. Some of the first attempts came in the late 1800’s but it was not until the 1970’s that some successful attempts were made to regulate contributions. The Federal Election Campaigning Act required candidates to disclose the amount and who a contribution was received from as well as any campaign expenses that were incurred throughout the entire campaign. These actions lead to the creation of the Federal Election Commission. The FEC, as they are often known, regulates everything that has to do with a political election and enforces the rules and regulations. Today with the availability of the internet any politician that runs for federal office is required to submit income and spending reports and these reports are available for the public to view and see the campaign expenses as well as where the politicians received their money. The FEC attempted to limit the amount of contributions by wealthy contributors to $1,000.00 and the contributions by Political Action Committees to $5,000.00. Throughout history there have been many attempts by wealthy individuals to buy votes and to influence candidate’s view and beliefs. Ulysses S. Grant owes his getting elected to several wealthy investors. He was not the only one. Throughout the nation’s history there have been several presidents that have fallen victim to owing investors money for supporting their run for the office of the presidency. Abraham Lincoln was almost forced to declare bankruptcy himself in his first run for the presidents office. There have been many occurrences in history where corporations or individuals have purchased certain services or items for a political campaign. This could range anywhere from air time on television to newspaper ad’s before television. There are many ways that a corporation can influence a candidate and not contribute money directly to the campaign. For this reason I believe that corporations should not be able to contribute money or services of any kind to any political campaign. I believe that campaigns should rely on the personal wealth and contributions of individuals to run a campaign. This would require the candidates to visit more places in person in order to raise the money needed to run their campaign. This would also allow the candidates to form more of a relationship with the people that they will be serving in their public office. It would also allow them to see the faces of the people that are affected by the consequences of the actions and any law or regulation that is implemented while they are in office. The theory that comes close to what I believe about corporate contributions to political campaigns would be the contemporary ethics theory. I do also agree with the concept of utilitarianism, contemporary ethics more closely agrees with my views on this issue. The classical ethics theory looks at an action and whether or not it is right on wrong based upon the actions that will occur. The contemporary ethics theory focuses on the actual person and looks at the character of that person to make the decision. When it comes to the subject of politics I believe that people should not look at what a person claims they can give you but instead look at what they have accomplished and their character and beliefs to make a determination on who to vote for and who to give their donations. In today’s politics it is ever more important that we focus on the character of politicians instead of what they say that they can or will provide to the people. The biggest flaw that comes with the political territory is greed. Corporations offer money and services and in turn the politicians give government grant money, push certain bills into law, and even turn a blind eye to possible illegal stock market trading for a portion of the profits. I believe that in today’s world the politicians have forgotten who they serve and who gives them the power that they obtain from the constitution. It’s the people who vote for them and support them. When you add the corporation’s contributions and the various other services that they bring to the table it sets fire the sensation of greed within the heart of the politicians and they forget who it is they are really serving. They may receive funds and other gifts from the corporations but the people of the nation are the ones who suffer because of broken promises and a lack of attention to the people they are serving. For this reason I am against corporate contributions to political campaigns. The focus shifts from serving the people of this country to serving the ones who give them money and with money in mind people shift from wanting to do what is right to how can I make more and more money. The most recent housing and financial crisis could have been adverted but when Freddie and Fannie Mac were looked at to cut the amount of investments that could be made against their capital. President Bush made the recommendation and when it went up for congress it was voted against because of the number of investors that were corporate sponsors and a number of congressmen owned stock in the two companies. In conclusion I believe that this country has strayed greatly from the values and principles on which the country was founded. Today’s politics have greatly clouded many great minds that serve the country and the only focus that politicians have today is how to make more and more money and pleasing the people that give and help make them money. This can clearly been seen from the most recent housing and financial crisis that the country most recently suffered. Once again politicians are focused more on making money and pleasing the ones that make them the money. Corporations only cause more problems when being added to the mix of politics and should refrain from contributing to any political campaign.
References
Mosser, K. (2010). Ethics & social responsibility (Sec. 1.8)
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