Role of PACs Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Role of PACs - Essay Example President Theodre Roosevelt in 1905 brought laws which could govern the conducts of aspirants during the campaign in order to reduce the abuses which had been reported. With him, came the Campaign Finance Act, which led to the limitation of wealthy individuals and special interest groups from funding aspirants. By this time, Political Action Committee (PAC) has been existing and they have had responsibilities in supporting the candidates and used a lot of money leading to the abuses. The successive developments in the PACs have been crucial in influencing the American political campaign as many of them are found of giving a larger amount of money to candidates with most recorded going to the presidential candidates and senators as well as governess. This paper will examine the roles of PACs and their activities in relation to presidency, congress among other things. Funding of Supper PACs The source of funding for PACs has for over the years remained unrealistic as many of the acts p assed have not been effective in managing the sources of funding to the candidates in efforts to minimize the election abuses. There have been a lot of funding sources to the PACs which have not been legitimized but, they are working showing how much the federal election commission is reluctant in putting the law into force. According to the federal Election Commission act of 1971, there was regulation of campaign spending and deterred abuses which were not to be disclosed to the public, as well as the individual’s contribution to the PACs. The act limited the individual’s contribution to $ 5,000 per year; it bared corporate organization and unions from directly contributing to the federal PACs. The act allowed the PACs to solicit contributions from executives, shareholders and members of their families. Since then, PACs have been solely mandated to solicit funds from individuals to a certain amount and prohibited unions and corporations from funding money for campaign s but instead for meeting administrative costs. However, the situation has since changed as the case file between Citizens United and the federal election commission in the Supreme Court allowed PACs to get unlimited funding from unions and corporations. PACs have a wider sources of funding ranging from cooperate organizations to individuals shares contributions (Welch et al 242). PACs Agenda The agenda of PACs has been to campaign for their presidential candidates in every manner. This has been achieved through spreading negative propaganda against their opponents by smearing campaign. They are meant to look for tactics and campaign strategies which will make their candidates excel through influencing more preferences towards him or her. Their agenda is to influence voters through mass adverts in the media which will be in their favor and goes against their opponents. Throughout their activities, they have influenced the outcome of the presidential and congress outcome as well as i nfluencing the public opinion and participation by the roles they play in campaigns for or against candidates. This has made them have a crucial agenda in determining the outcome of the presidential election, as well as the voter’s participation through the use of money (Luhr par 3). Similarly, they have an outstanding role in influencing the congress towards implementing policies,