PACs--Do we need them?
...are for the protection of women’s rights. Members of the nation’s NOWPACs are all expected to stand for six major issues: 1.) Reproductive freedom without restriction. 2.) Civil Rights for all people-with emphasis on lesbian and gay rights and racial justice. 3.) Moving women out of poverty through empowering, non-punitive welfare policies. 4.) A constitutional amendment that guarantees women’s equality, reproductive rights and non-discrimination based on sexual orientation. 5.) Affirmative action ensuring equal opportunity for women and people of color. 6.) Ending violence against women. The NOWPAC organization is one that has been hugely successful due to their effective strategies of organizing support campaigns early and following up on their commitments. They have activists working at level of government, targeting states and districts where there are strong feminist candidates, especially ones early in their careers. Some of the NOWPACs’ success stories include: doubling the number of women in Congress in 1992 with the “Elect Women for a Change” project, helping elect more than 60 feminists to both state and local office in 1994, helping elect the first woman governor in New Hampshire and first woman senator from Louisiana in 1996. On the other side, there are various PACs who are against the NOWPAC. While there is not a dominant one against women’s rights, there are many smaller organizations that are against many of the pro-choice and same-sex marriage ideas the NOWPAC so strongly stands for. The Traditional Values Coalition (TVC) is the largest non-denominational, grassroots church lobby in America. (www.traditionalvalues.org) It includes over 43,000 churches of all races throughout the United States. Although its main focus is on restoring the church’s role in America, the key issues of the TVC are ones that are against the NOWPAC. The ones most strongly against the NOWPAC are as follows: 1.) Right to life: “We believe that every human deserves the right to life—from conception to death—and that we do not have the right to kill unborn children nor to murder the elderly through active euthanasia…” 2.) Homosexuality, Bi-Sexuality, Transgenderism, and Other Deviant Sexual Behaviors: “The Bible clearly condemns all sexual behaviors outside of marriage between one man and one woman. Homosexual behavior is explicitly condemned in both the Old and New Testaments….” The TVC is not as present in the media with campaigning as the NOWPAC, but along with the other small groups that support the same ideas they provide a balanced amount of money and information to the campaigns and the public on their stances. The TVC members are most popular at speaking at conventions where candidates or candidate supporters will be. Their chairpersons participated in a televised debate over abortion this past year, gathering support for the Republican Party. TVC pastors were noted for influencing the November election concerning homosexual marriages. Political Action Committees, despite their many contributions, have created a nation-wide dispute on their importance. The arguments against PACs seem valid at first, but what many fail to realize is that with some modifications placed on PACs in the future, these organizations are a major part of American Democracy. Expenses have grown immensely over the years, making it very costly to run for office, “…so expensive that it takes lots of money to even get beat with.” (Will Rogers, www.campaignfinance.org) PACs are partially to blame for this, an argument those against them use. Looking at all of the expenses on a whole, though, shows that the increase ultimately comes from the increase of costs in communications. With all of the new developments today, it costs much more to broadcast information to the...