Attacks on ALEC: Transparency or policy?

Is it transparency? Or is it policy? The American Legislative Exchange Council was under attack this week, mostly for not being transparent, from organizations led by the Alliance for a Better Utah. What is behind the attack?

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This week, the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, for short, held its 39th Annual Meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah. In the days leading up to the event, a number of local and not local organizations mobilized their membership to protest ALEC. While not directly familiar with ALEC, one local organization–called the Alliance for a Better Utah, or ABU–seemed to be taking the lead and making the most noise in protest. Read more here in my post “.

In an effort to keep some balance, as well as to understand ALEC and the hullabaloo around their visit to Salt Lake, I decided to take a look at them and what they represent. As always, the guiding principle is “follow the money.”

Needless to say, between ABU and ABU’s fellow travelers, there has been a lot of hubbub, and several news stories, around ALEC’s Annual Meeting.

• ALEC bringing its clout, agenda and convention to Utah (Salt Lake Tribune, July 14, 2012)
• McEntee: Lawmaker quits ALEC over lack of openness (Salt Lake Tribune, July 18, 2012)
• Editorial: Why are people critical of ALEC? (Deseret News, July 22, 2012)
• ALEC members gather to advance economic work in the states (Deseret News, July 24, 2012)
• ALEC conservatives reject charges of corporate cronyism (Salt Lake Tribune, July 25, 2012)
• Groups disagree over power ALEC holds with state lawmakers (KSL.com, July 25, 2012)
• ALEC meeting sparks support from governor, protests (Deseret News, July 25, 2012)
• Geese and Ganders (Salt Lake Tribune, July 25, 2012)
• ALEC provides receptive crowd for Utah’s land battles (Salt Lake Tribune, July 26, 2012)
• Protestors rally against conservative lawmaker’s group; 1 arrested (KSL.com, July 26, 2012)
• DeChristopher supporters stage peaceful protest at ALEC convention (Deseret News, July 26, 2012)
• Editorial: “The identity of our bills impacts views on purpose and intent” (Deseret News, July 26, 2012)
• Salt Lake Tribune Editorial Board: ALEC in Utah (Salt Lake Tribune, July 27, 2012)

And that’s just from two (ok, three, if you count KSL, which shares a newsroom with Deseret News) news organizations.

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Why ABU wants you to care about ALEC

In an editorial, the Salt Lake Tribune editorial board opined that ALEC is designed to serve the will of the wealthy at the expense of the “average”:

What is troubling is that the shop they talk [at the ALEC Annual Meeting] is all about amending state laws across the country so that they better serve the interests of private wealth and pay less heed to the requirements of average citizens.

Further,

ALEC is organized under federal tax law as a charitable organization. Which means that the many thousands of dollars given to it by corporations to wine, dine and provide child care for junketing lawmakers are treated as tax-free charitable donations, even though the real purpose is clearly to lobby elected officials, something that organizations so constituted are specifically prohibited from doing.

If Utah lawmakers truly believe in the wisdom of these ALEC-style measures, they should carry them themselves, without the help of an organization that deserves to be under serious scrutiny from the IRS.

It’s an argument that ABU founder Josh Kanter reiterates in his editorial in the Deseret News.

The word that’s missing is “transparency,” but the clear accusation is that ALEC hides the ball from ordinary citizens, using its tax-exempt status to lobby legislators out of sight from the public.  I dispute that the Salt Lake editorial board knows what the “requirements of average citizens” are, or even who an average citizen necessarily, but beyond that, I am sympathetic to their point: public policy should be formed in the light of day, not in back rooms between the elite and lawmakers.

What is the American Legislative Exchange Council?

According to ALEC’s website, the organization’s purpose is to “advance the fundamental principles of free-market enterprise, limited government, and federalism at the state level through a nonpartisan public-private partnership of America’s state legislators, members of the private sector and the general public.”

Founded in 1973 by a coterie of conservative politicians and activists, including as participants in its early years Jack Kemp, Lou Barnett, John Buckley, and Jesse Helms, ALEC rose in prominence during the Reagan Administration and eventually established task forces on nearly every responsibility of state government.

It’s clearly a right leaning organization, and ALEC does not appear to hide the fact. It’s board of directors, which includes our own state senator Curt Bramble,  are all Republican state legislators. A board of academics listed on the ALEC website includes Dr. Arthur B. Laffer (as in “the Laffer curve“) and Stephen Moore (a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board). It’s a conservative group through and through.

Not surprisingly, the legislation they propose and draft (often “model legislation”) is, to say the least, conservative. It’s legislation focused on the free-market, to remove crony capitalism and excessive regulation alike. It’s legislation focused on limited government, pushing back on the expansion of governmental overreach into areas of life that is better left to individual initiative and effort.  It’s legislation focused on strengthening federalism, the uniquely American system of government that divides reserves powers not specifically allocated to the federal government to the states (states are not political subdivisions of the federal government).

So? So, when this legislation is proposed to lawmakers, critiques contend, citizens cannot form an opinion based on its source, primarily because they do not know from whence it comes. Lobbyists, on the other hand, are required to register, are limited from expenditures above a certain level without filing disclosures. Further, ALEC acts as a curtain to allow corporations to get access to legislators without passing through public channels.

Transparency? Or policy disagreement?

Is this what happens?  I suppose it is possible. I’m not sure how pernicious it is for an organization of Republican legislators to propose and help each other draft legislation that is in line with Republican principles.  ALEC’s annual meeting in Salt Lake was open to the public and it was reportedly attended by members of the press in addition to non-legislators.

I suspect, however, that the ire which ALEC raises in its critics is just as much related to the content as it is to the process. ALEC is clearly on the political right, and by organizing Republican legislators nationwide, is able to level and network influence to spread ideas for legislation successfully.   It’s difficult for progressive, Democratically inclined organizations like the Alliance of a Better Utah to attack those principles in a heavily Republican state like Utah. Alternately, if ABU and other politically left organizations can attack ALEC  on transparency grounds, it can raise questions in citizen minds and diminish ALEC’s ability to influence legislation.

Yes, transparency is important. But is it the real reason ABU, Common Cause, and the AFL-CIO are attacking ALEC? Or is it just because they don’t agree with ALEC’s policy proposals?