Campaign Finance Disclosure and the Information Tradeoff

AuthorMichael D. Gilbert
PositionAssociate Professor, University of Virginia School of Law
Pages1847-1894
1847
Campaign Finance Disclosure and the
Information Tradeoff
Michael D. Gilbert
INTRODUCTION .................................................................................... 1849
I. BACKGROUND ...................................................................................... 1854
A. LAW OF DISCLOSURE ....................................................................... 1854
B. THE INFORMATION INTEREST ......................................................... 1858
C. POLICY AND CONSTITUTIONAL CALCULUS ....................................... 1861
II. THE INFORMATION TRADEOFF ............................................................. 1862
A. DISCLOSURE, POLICY, AND THE FIRST AMENDMENT ......................... 1863
B. THE INFORMATION INTEREST REVISITED ......................................... 1866
C. THE AVERAGE VOTER ..................................................................... 1869
D. LOW THRESHOLDS, TECHNOLOGY, AND LOOPHOLES ........................ 1871
1. Low Reporting Thresholds .................................................. 1871
2. Technology and Disclosure ................................................. 1873
3. Disclosure Loopholes ........................................................... 1875
E. QUALITY OF SPEECH ....................................................................... 1876
III. ALTERNATIVE DISCLOSURE REGIMES ................................................... 1878
A. “SEMI-DISCLOSURE ....................................................................... 1878
B. COERCED ANONYMITY .................................................................... 1879
C. VOLUNTARY DISCLOSURE ................................................................ 1881
IV. DISCLOSURE THAWS SPEECH ............................................................... 1883
A. DISCLOSURE AND CREDIBILITY ........................................................ 1884
B. DISCLOSURE AND POLICY VALUE ..................................................... 1886
C. CAN THE MARKET FILL THE GAP? ................................................... 1888
D. IMPLICATIONS OF THE THAWING EFFECT ......................................... 1889
Associate Professor, University o f Virginia School of Law. For helpful comments I thank
Quinn Curtis, Chris Elmendorf, Elizabeth Garrett, John Harrison, Debbie Hellman, Rich
Hynes, Leslie Kendrick, Ethan Leib, Caleb Nelson, Dan Ortiz, Fred Schauer, Rich Schragger,
Jed Stiglitz, and workshop participants at UVA Law School, the 2013 American Law and
Economics Association Annual Meeting, and the 2012 Midwest Law and Economics Association
Annual Meeting.
1848 IOWA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 98:1847
V. NEXT STEPS: DISCLOSURE AS REGULATORY PROBLEM ......................... 1890
CONCLUSION ....................................................................................... 1893
2013] CAMPAIGN FINANCE DISCLOSURE 1849
Campaign finance law is in shambles, and many believe that wealthy,
shadowy interests dominate American politics. Reformers have rested their
hopes on disclosure—mandated, public disclosure of what individuals,
corporations, super PACs, and others spend on politics. Reformers argue
that disclosure provides valuable information to voters, and the Supreme
Court agrees. Opponents, on the other hand, vilify disclosure for chilling
speech and infringing the First Amendment rights of speakers. Both
positions—disclosure informs voters, disclosure chills speech—have become
conventional wisdom.
This Article challenges that wisdom. First, it shows that disclosure does
not necessarily inform voters. Rather, it creates an information tradeoff.
Revealing sources of speech provides voters with information, but disclosure
can also chill speech, and that takes information away—the information
contained in the chilled speech. When the second effect outweighs the first,
disclosure actually reduces voter information. Second, this Article argues
that disclosure does not necessarily chill speech. It can thaw it. By providing
potential speakers with information about the positions and credibility of
candidates, disclosure can prompt actors to speak when they otherwise
would not. When disclosure thaws speech, there is no information tradeoff.
Voters gain information in two ways—source revelation and more speech
acts—and lose it in none. When disclosure thaws speech, it promotes exactly
those First Amendment values it is thought to undermine.
INTRODUCTION
In Citizens United, the Supreme Court struck down prohibitions on
independent political expenditures by corporations.1 President Obama
reacted swiftly, stating in his 2010 State of the Union Address that the
decision would “open the floodgates for special interests—including foreign
corporations—to spend without limit in our elections.”2 Both President
Obama and other policymakers turned to disclosure as an antidote. In 2010,
the House of Representatives passed the Disclose Act, which required
disclosure of the financers of some political advertisements.3 The White
House contemplated requiring government contractors to disclose some of
their political donations.4 The Federal Election Commission (“FEC”) has
1. Citizens United v. FEC, 130 S. Ct. 876 (2010).
2. President Barack Obama, Remarks by the President in State of the Uni on Address
(Jan. 27, 2010), available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-
state-union-address.
3. Dan Eggen, Bill on Political Ad Disclosures Falls a Little Short in Senate, WASH. POST (July 28,
2010), http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2010/07/27/AR2010072704656.
html.
4. Perry Bacon Jr. & T.W. Farnam, Obama Weighs Disclosure Order for Contractors, WASH.
POST (Apr. 20, 2011), http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-04-20/politics/35230286_1_
president-obama-obama-administration-jay-carney. The White House has given up on this, at
least until after the 2012 election. See Mike Lillis, White House Abandons Push for Federal

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