Mo. House leaders could benefit from contribution limit repeal

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- The Missouri Ethics Commission has given a financial incentive to some top House members to repeal the state's campaign contribution limits.

House Speaker-designee Ron Richard has nearly $83,000 in campaign money on the line. House Budget Committee chairman Allen Icet has more than $34,000 hanging in the balance.

Both say they support the repeal of Missouri's contribution limits, which already passed the Senate and is expected to come before the House by the May 16 end of the legislative session.

But neither Richard nor Icet says there is any connection between support for the legislation and a recent Ethics Commission's decision allowing them to keep tens of thousands of dollars that they must refund if limits remain in place.

Changing the law

Icet and Richard both voted to repeal contributions limits once before, in 2006.

As a result of that largely party-line vote in the Republican-led House, Missouri politicians could accept unlimited amounts of money from individuals, businesses and interest groups beginning Jan. 1, 2007.

But the Missouri Supreme Court reinstated the limits July 19, 2007, striking down the repeal because of what amounted to a procedural technicality.

The Supreme Court generally suggested the donation limits should be reinstated retroactively but left it to the Ethics Commission to determine on a case-by-case basis. The court specifically allowed an exception, if candidates could prove they relied on the law in place at the time and that refunding the money now would pose a hardship.

Most candidates said last fall that they would voluntarily refund any contributions larger than the retroactively reimposed limits.

But some, including Richard and Icet, asked the Ethics Commission for hardship exemptions. They argued they already had spent many of those large contributions while campaigning against each other for a Republican caucus election Sept. 19 to nominate the next House speaker.

Several others who ran for different House Republican leadership positions made similar hardship arguments and were granted refund exemptions by the Ethics Commission earlier this month.

Complicated decisions

But the panel's decisions for Richard and Icet were more complex.

Had the commission strictly applied the law, it could have forced Richard to refund $146,743 in contributions received during the first half of 2007 that were above the retroactively reimposed limit of $325 per donation for House candidates.

But the commission let Richard keep $1,275 from each contributor -- an amount equal to the cap for a statewide candidate. The commission noted that House speaker candidates used to be able to raise money as if they were running for statewide office, before that law also was repealed in 2006.

After applying a similar rational to Icet, the Ethics Commission knocked down the potential refund amounts to $82,981 for Richard and $34,050 for Icet.

Then the commission added an escape clause: If the legislature once again repeals contribution limits during its 2008 session, Richard and Icet won't have to refund anything.

Richard, R-Joplin, said he supports repealing the limits again. But when asked whether he had an extra incentive to back the legislation this year, Richard replied that he might abstain from the vote.

"I don't want to have any innuendo that I'm doing it for monetary reasons," Richard said.

Icet, R-Wildwood, was less concerned about that.

"Whether I have to give the money back or not, I'm going to vote for the bill," Icet said.

Like other backers of the repeal, Icet and Richard both said that unlimited contributions could bring more transparency to campaigns. Without limits, wealthier donors would not need to channel money in small chunks through numerous committees to get a bundle of cash to their favorite candidates (though they still could choose to do so to obscure the source of the money).

"The best way to fix any sort of issues with graft and corruption is to be completely transparent," Icet said. "So if someone writes me a $100,000 check, I have to defend it."

House Speaker Rod Jetton on Thursday referred the Senate bill repealing the contribution limits to the House Elections Committee -- a first step in getting it to the House floor.

Jetton, R-Marble Hill, supports the repeal but has no similar financial stake in the vote and is barred from seeking re-election by term limits. He said Richard and Icet should be cut some slack for supporting the legislation.

"If they had never voted or taken a position on it before, you could maybe argue that" they were in a politically awkward position by supporting it, Jetton said. But "they have consistently been for getting rid of the limits."

This time, it just has a more direct effect.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Capitol Correspondent David A. Lieb covers Missouri government and politics for The Associated Press.