MISSOURI COMMENTARY: NIBBLING THE EAR, OR EATING THE BRAIN?

The obvious topic for a column would be the machinations of the stock market. Sine I do not understand the stock market, I had better avoid that topic and discuss once again a topic that is also in the news and that has vexed me for years: money and politics.

Money has always been a factor in American politics. In the 1996 election, we crossed over the line between being "a" factor and being "the" factor. Now and henceforth, money will be the factor in American politics. Everything else will be secondary. Money is the exclusive, pre-eminent determinant of the outcome of federal elections.

Abraham Lincoln had to devote some of his time to raising campaign funds -- but not so much time as to interfere with his performance as a candidate or with his decision-making in office.

William McKinley had Mark Harma as his money bag man. The price of politics nudged up.

Money flowed rather freely in the terms of Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover.

Raising campaign funds posed a serious problem for Harry Truman. Even life-long Democrats were reluctant to give to Truman since he was certain to lose to Thomas Dewey. Why throw your money away? There was no television in the 1948 campaign. Radio was the national medium and Truman advisers sometimes had to pass the hat to pay for the next night's broadcast.

Television launched the era of big political money. The new national method of public expression cost more and more. One hundred dollars a plate dinners weren't enough to feed a coast-to-coast television campaign. Any event less than $1,000 a head was too skimpy for presidential politics. Let the money flow.

In earlier times, big contributions were rationalized as simply one way a person could express his or her views. Fat cats were simply rich people who had a hobby of giving their money away for the fun of it. Nothing at all to worry about, so the political types said.

As the contributions grew form hundreds to thousands to tens of thousands of dollars, the fun and games pretense couldn't pass muster. The new rationale was access. These big contributions only provided access to the office holder. After all, wealthy groups could buy access to famous doctors, to famous architects, to famous universities. Nothing illegal about having a little access to politicians. After all, aren't politicians suppose to be accessible?

Now things have moved beyond the access excuse. When money is shoveled by the tens and tens of thousands -- indeed, millions -- from individuals and groups with specific political wish lists, you are far beyond the fun and games explanation. You have moved well past the notion, "I only want a chance to make my case." You have crossed over into "I want a chance to make my case and I am expecting you to agree with my case."

Trial lawyers don't contribute millions to Democrats just for the right to be heard on the issue of product liability. The counterpart business lobby doesn't contribute millions to Republicans just for the right to be heard on that same issue.

Labor unions have their wish lists and don't spend millions because they think it is lots of fun. Likewise, business groups are not deep into political fund-raising to get a few laughs.

It's now quid pro quo. The money men produce the quid and want the politician to be an agreeing quo.

Bill Clinton, of all our presidents, was the most active with influencing the fund-raising goals of the 1996 campaign. Later on, Bob Dole played an active part in fund-raising for his campaign, but got about the business far too late. The Republicans spent more money than the Democrats in 1996, but spent most of it after the voters had made up their minds.

The candidate in the next election will learn from the 1996 election. The lesson will not be to avoid the mass fund-raising activities. The lesson will be "we have to raise more and spend it earlier."

Robert Reich, Clinton's former Secretary of Labor, claims that presidents and congressional office holders are not so directly influenced on some of the issues on which they vote.

Big money, he says, gets the candidate "immersed in the culture of the comfortable. Access to the network of the wealthy does not buy a politician's mind; instead, it nibbles constantly, sweetly at his ear." Mr. Reich is behind the times. The ear has already been digested. The fat cats are now nibbling constantly on the candidate's brain.

~Tom Eagleton of St. Louis is a former U.S. senator from Missouri.