Marc Caplan notes the movement for more publicly funded elections is alive and well, and stands to make serious gains in the coming years:
Former Sen. John Edwards' decision last month to accept public financing for the Democratic primaries made news because all the other leading candidates had abandoned the public system in favor of relying on private donations. But Edwards later clarified that he would not rule out accepting private funds for the general election. The reality is that the present presidential public-financing system isn't working and that all the leading Democratic contenders have endorsed fixing it.What hasn't made headlines, but should, is substantial activity to enact new comprehensive public-financing systems in several states. Last month, for example, Democrats in the New Hampshire House of Representatives made it a priority to establish a framework for public financing of state elections for the 2008 legislative session. This was a startling development, considering that the state legislature had not even considered a public-financing bill in the last seven years.
Read the rest (and comment) here. --The Editors
