Legal Bribery

Webster’s Dictionary defines a bribe as “money or favor bestowed on or promised to a person in a position of trust to pervert his judgment or corrupt his conduct.” The website Total Legal Defense defines bribery as “an attempt to influence another person’s actions, usually a government or public official employee, by offering a benefit in exchange for the desired decision.” A more complicated definition is contained in Black’s Law Dictionary, which defines a bribe as “any money, goods, right in action, property, thing of value, or any preferment, advantage, privilege or emolument, or any promise or undertaking to give any, asked, given, or accepted, with a corrupt intent to influence action, vote, or opinion of a person in any public or official capacity.”

It is clear there is a fine line between legal and illegal bribery. Everyone knows politicians buy and sell votes all the time. They will never admit, however, that their vote was influenced by the “advantage” or “privilege” they received. They will always claim there was no quid pro quo. In other words, they will always claim there was no express agreement they would vote a certain way in exchange for something given or received. Politicians know how to play the game. There’s a wink, a nod, and an understanding, but no one expressly says, “I will vote this way if you do this for me.” In other words, politicians know how to bribe each other and how to accept bribes without crossing the line so that their conduct becomes illegal. It’s legal bribery.

The most recent example of legal bribery occurred last week in connection with the U.S. Senate’s vote to proceed with debate on the proposed health care legislation. Under the Senate’s rules, 60 votes were needed to proceed with debate. Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu’s vote was needed to get to 60, but she was on the fence. She had not announced her position on the vote, but she had expressed concerns about the legislation’s costs. All of a sudden, new language was added to the legislation that would provide increased federal subsidies to the State of Louisiana at the expense of taxpayers in other states. Some reports said the new federal subsidies for Louisiana would cost the taxpayers an additional $100 million. Sen. Landrieu said, “It’s not $100 million, it’s $300 million, and I’m proud of it and will keep fighting for it.” After the new language benefitting Louisiana was added to the proposed legislation, Sen. Landrieu immediately jumped off the fence and announced she would vote to proceed with the debate. Although she had previously expressed concern about the cost of the legislation, she voted “yes” after the cost went up rather than down. She voted “yes” because of the “advantage” or “privilege” added to the legislation to benefit her state and to benefit her politically.

Unfortunately, many votes in Congress are purchased or influenced through taxpayer funding for projects favored by individual members of Congress whose votes are needed to pass unrelated legislation. The terms “earmark” and “pork” refer to the way the game is played. Individual members of Congress agree to vote for legislation in exchange for taxpayer funding of projects that benefit their home districts. They can then go home and say to the voters, “Look what I did for you. I deserve to be re-elected so I can send even more money your way.”

The $787 billion stimulus legislation adopted by Congress earlier this year was full of “earmarks” and “pork” inserted in the legislation in order to buy votes in favor of the legislation from individual members of Congress. The legislation passed the House of Representatives with no Republican votes. In the Senate, three Republicans, one of whom has since become a Democrat, voted for the legislation. Needless to say, most of the “pork” contained in the stimulus legislation was designed to benefit the Democrats who voted for it.

Both Republicans and Democrats have played this game extensively. The majority party always has the advantage, and the majority party always plays the game regardless of which party it is. The minority party complains when it is the minority party, but it plays the same game when it becomes the majority party.

The game is played with your money and my money. Taxpayer money is used to fund projects that provide a benefit or advantage to individual members of Congress, who then vote for the legislation containing the benefit or advantage for which they negotiated in exchange for their vote. In the process, federal tax dollars are being used to pay for local and state projects that, even if worthy, should be funded by the local or state taxpayers who will benefit from the projects and not by the taxpayers in other states.

There are many other ways in which politicians buy votes with taxpayer money. During last year’s Presidential campaign, President Obama made the famous promise that he would “spread the wealth around” if elected. In other words, he was promising to use the tax system to transfer money from those who have earned it to those who haven’t. By doing so, he was promising a benefit to a certain class of voters in exchange for their vote. The beneficiaries of the promise presumably will respond by saying, or at least thinking, “I will sell you my vote in exchange for your promise to provide benefits and advantages to me at the expense of someone else.”

The easiest thing for a politician to do is to give away someone else’s money. It’s as natural as breathing for the typical politician. It’s a way of survival. Politicians obtain power through their promises and remain in power by buying votes with taxpayer money.

After the last election, President Obama acknowledged he was indebted to the nation’s unions, who spent millions of dollars helping him get elected. The unions did not spend millions of dollars helping Obama get elected without expecting something in return. They are now getting what they wanted, although at a slower pace than they would like. But they will get more of what they want because Obama will need them to get re-elected in 2012.

Of course, the Republicans play the same game. They typically receive support from business groups and business lobbyists, who are expecting something in return for their investment. They get more support when they are the majority party because they have the ability to deliver. They get less support when they are in the minority because the “benefit” or “advantage” is less clear.

Many individuals, of course, give money to politicians who support their views. The typical individual, however, does not give enough money to buy influence. There can be no doubt, however, that the unions and business lobbyists who give millions of dollars to politicians are expecting something in return, and the politicians who receive the money know it. There may not be an express quid pro quo, but there’s a wink, a nod, and an understanding.

The bottom line is that politicians from both parties know how to play the game. They know how to walk the fine line between legal and illegal bribery. If you examine the various definitions of bribery, however, it is obvious that bribery is rampant in our political system.