Court Decision Highlights Need for Transparency

The Dickie Scruggs story has brought to light an important question for us Mississippians. Can our judicial system be bought? Unlike many, I am going to wait until all the facts come out before I rush to judgment on the Scruggs case. There is a large public outcry related to this case as Mississippians are not comfortable with the idea of our judges accepting money for favorable decisions. I will say that the case reeks of a partisan hit to remove the last elected Democrat (Jim Hood) from office. While the Scruggs case has garnered a lot of attention, there is another more prevalent method of using money to influence the courts of Mississippi.

When the Mississippi Supreme Court rendered their 7-2 decision to wait until November to hold the election for the Senate seat vacated by Trent Lott, it meant one thing. The courts rendered the decision in the best of interest of those who paid for them to get elected. This trend is not isolated to Mississippi, but is occurring nationwide.

“Forbes magazine reports that two years ago in
Mississippi, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce poured over $1 million into a
successful bid to unseat Justice Chuck McRea, who, in their view, was
antibusiness.”

That is just one example of one group pumping major cash into a Mississippi election. It looks like they are at it again according this LATimes article from last month. This article is about Tom Donahue who is the head of the US Chamber of Commerce.

“Reacting to what it sees as a potentially hostile
political climate, Donohue said, the chamber will seek to punish candidates who
target business interests with their rhetoric or policy proposals, including
congressional and state-level candidates.Although Donohue shied away from
precise figures, he indicated that his organization would spend in excess of the
approximately $60 million it spent in the last presidential cycle.”

Big business has infiltrated our court system to the detriment of Mississippians. The judges’ interests lie not with the people of Mississippi, but with big business that put them in office. The citizen’s of Mississippi have a right to know where these huge campaign donations are coming from, especially when they are coming from PAC’s and other political interests located out of state. That seems common sense to me, right? Only the governor of our state does not agree with this basic logic. He believes that government should be shrouded in a cloud of secrecy, and that as Mississippians we do not have the right to know where outside money comes from in our political elections. Barbour vetoed a bill that would have made transparent the funding from these organizations. I have no problem with outside groups like PAC’s becoming involved, just let there be disclosure on where the money is coming from. Our electorate has the right to be informed when making a decision.

As the Sun Herald voiced on Monday, our democracy is reliant on an informed voter base.

“The business of government is a costly enterprise,
and its stockholders, the people of Mississippi, must feed the treasury year
after year to keep the state, counties, towns and cities afloat.
Last year, Mississippi taxpayers ponied up billions to complete their part of the social
contract that keeps democracy of, for, and by the people - and the people's
pocketbook - alive.
But, in what might be considered a not-so-kind twist to
the partnership of people and politicians, those who pass the laws have
constantly chosen to limit the information that is shared with the very people
who elect them and fund their activities.
At every turn, you will discover where state lawmakers have tightened the flow of information about government that the electorate needs to make informed decisions.”

While this issue has been discussed for quite some time, the recent partisan Supreme Court decision made it an entirely relevant discussion again. As Mississippians we deserve to know all relevant information when making a decision in the voting booth. As Mississippians we deserve to know when millions of dollars are being spent by outsiders to influence our elections. As Mississippians we deserve to know where the money is coming from.