In Defense of Lobbying
by Tom Shanahan

A proposal in the state Maine a few years ago would have required lobbyists to wear bright orange vests whenever they were present in the state Capitol - the same kind that deer hunters wear in the woods to prevent being shot. The folks in Augusta don't have a monopoly on ridiculous ideas. Right here in Albany, a recent proposal by a coalition of self-styled "good government" groups, would have mandated that lobbyists wear visible identification tags in the New York state Capitol.

Both ideas are eerily reminiscent of the medieval practice of forcing lepers to wear bells, to warn away anyone else who might come near. And that, of course, is the entire purpose behind such ideas - to publicly mark lobbyists for all to see, and by doing so, warn others to stay away. It's simply a heavy-handed, not to mention unconstitutional, way to try and prevent lobbyists from representing their clients.

So, what, exactly, is it about lobbyists that inspires all these far-out ideas to restrict them in ways not applied to other citizens - to the absurd point of trying to dictate what clothing they must wear in public places?

Maybe we should call it "the Jack Abramoff effect." Abramoff is the Washington lobbyist who recently entered a guilty plea for committing bank fraud, stealing millions of dollars from his clients, and conspiring to bribe members of Congress.

Even though that was in Washington, it's an effect which has inspired the Executive Director of the state Lobbying Commission in Albany to change his long-established opinion regarding how the Commission measures whether a lobbyist has exceeded gift limits, and recommend the sudden adoption of a more restrictive standard. By sudden, I mean that some members of the Commission have publicly stated they didn't even realize that's where their decisions were headed.

In the past year, we have witnessed two confirmation hearings for Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, and been regularly reminded of the importance of the legal principle of "stare decisis," which means to stand by precedent and not disturb a settled point. When it comes to regulating lobbyists, such long-held principles no longer apply. That is the power of the Abramoff effect.

Distrust of lobbyists is not a new phenomenon. In 1877, an interesting clause was adopted as part of the Georgia State Constitution. It said, quite simply, "Lobbying is declared to be a crime." Fortunately, such provisions are themselves unconstitutional, since they violate not one, but two protections of the First Amendment - that "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or ... to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

One New York newspaper, the Ithaca Journal, went so far recently as to call professional lobbyists "a boil on the democratic process." What's disconcerting about this is that newspapers depend on their First Amendment protections to operate, and are highly protective of those rights whenever they perceive a threat to them. Yet, when lobbyists exercise those same rights, it somehow becomes "a boil on the democratic process." It's a double standard plain and simple.

Our first amendment rights are the same. They aren't better or worse, pure or tainted, depending on who's exercising them.

Most people have an image of a lobbyist as a well-paid, well-dressed agent of a wealthy private company, and certainly there are many who fit that description. But that is only one part of the picture.

It's obvious why a private company would hire someone to be involved in the business of government; after all, government is often quite ready to intrude in the business of private companies. But lobbyists also represent almost every diverse interest found in modern society. To balance those corporate lobbyists you will find union delegates. In the high-ceilinged halls outside our Legislative chambers - lobbyists are, after all, actually found in lobbies - you will find agents of heavy industry positioned right next to back-to-nature environmentalists. There will be self-styled "citizens" groups, a term which seems to imply that other interests don't represent citizens, and victims' rights advocates standing next to prison reformers. You will find champions of young and old, rich and poor, people with a variety of medical afflictions, and the medical professionals whose job it is to heal them.

Yes, lobbyists do indeed represent special interests. The trouble is, almost every single one of us has an interest that we find special.

More importantly, almost every one of us is represented in some way at the Capitol, most people just don't realize it. If you belong to a union, have a child in school, or have a hospital in your community, you are in some way represented. Farmers have the Farm Bureau, while newspapers, including the Ithaca Journal, belong to the New York Newspaper Publishers Association, and, you guessed it, they lobby at the Capitol. When reporters lobby for shield laws, so they can protect the identity of confidential sources without having to go to jail, are they too "a boil on the democratic process?"

According to the Lobbying Commission, $140 million was spent last year on lobbying in New York State. So where does all that money go? Well, some of it goes to pay salaries. Every lobbyist I've ever met has one disagreeable habit - they like to eat on a regular basis, as do members of their support staff. But much of that money was spent on issue-oriented advertising. Most readers of this page have seen those ads in one form or another.

Here's where that money doesn't go, it doesn't go into the pockets of our elected officials, despite the insinuations of the self-styled "good government" groups, who all appear to be marching in lockstep to the drumbeat of their own sanctimony every time such numbers are announced. What those groups, the same ones who called for lobbyists to wear visible identification in the Capitol, never get around to mentioning, is that they use registered lobbyists too.

The $140 million spent on lobbying sounds like a lot of money, but it must be considered in a larger context. It amounts to just over 1/10th of one percent of the state's $106 billion budget last year. Taken one step further, it amounted to about 15/100ths of one percent of the state's overall economy of $897 billion, the 11th largest in the world. Yet so much of what the state government does has a direct impact on that economy.

On more than one occasion, I have sat on the far side of a legislator's desk, and said, "I'm not sure if it's what you intended, but this is the effect your bill would have on my clients." Almost invariably, the response has been "No, that's not my intention at all." My suspicion is that most lobbyists have had the same experience. That's because an economy as large as New York's is so complex, legislators can't possibly hope to understand all the ramifications, intended and unintended, which could result from the nearly twenty thousand pieces of legislation that are considered each session. The principal business of the lobbyist is to explain those ramifications - to provide information. Quite often, the information a lobbyist provides helps keep that economy from suffering unintended damage, saves money for consumers, and prevents mistakes from becoming black-letter law.

Our representative democracy was designed by its founders to be a system of give and take between competing interests. In fact, both Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr lobbied right here in Albany. Lobbyists, and more importantly, the citizens they represent, are part of that give and take. Our diverse society has many competing, often conflicting interests, and not all the demands of those conflicting interests can, or even should be, satisfied by government. Lobbyists help those interests make their best case to the people who decide which will emerge from the councils of government satisfied, and which will be disappointed.

In the end, Jack Abramoff is no more typical of the way most lobbyists operate than Jayson Blair is representative of the way most reporters do their job. Both were found out and punished for their misdeeds. That must be considered before we rush off to answer the clarion call of reform. The boil which really needs lancing here is not lobbying, it's misinformation.

Tom Shanahan is founder and president of the Shanahan Group, an Albany-based government relations and communications firm.