Third, the public has come to perceive that elected officials, in effect, are being bought and that individuals are powerless against these interests.
Throughout its early history, the United States has endured without any laws regulating campaign financing. As corruption invaded Washington and began to influence politicians, actions were taken to resolve the problems. Historically, the major culprit of campaign finance was the Grant Administration with the infamous Tea Pot Dome scandal and other shady dealings. In the early 1900s, several laws were passed dealing with campaign financing, but it was not until 1971 that Congress passed the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA). The FECA set limits on spending, required disclosure of spending by candidates for federal office and also provided for public financing in Presidential campaigns. In 1974, Congress created the Federal Election Commission to enforce the act's provisions. Under laws enacted in that year, individuals could now contribute only one thousand dollars per election to a Presidential candidate and corporate political-action committees (PAC) were limited to five thousand dollar donations per election. To offset the loss of private financing money from the Federal Government was made available to candidates. In 1976, the Supreme Court ruled in Buckley vs. Valeo that mandatory spending limits violate free speech guarantees. Thus, in 1979, a package of amendments to the election campaign act allowed the use of donations to political parties rather than candidates, a "soft money" practice that has exploded in the 1990s. Most recently, in 1997, the McCain-Feingold bill, a bipartisan effort to close loopholes involving soft money, died in the Senate. .
In dealing with campaign finance, reforms have been made, but the 1974 campaign finance reform act must be updated. The act aimed at cleaning up the political money system has not kept up to date.
