There is more money than ever in American politics. A case currently before the Supreme Court has the potential to change the breadth of monetary influence for wealthy individuals.

Money buys influence, and in politics, influence is everything.

And this influence is often obtained through expensive, widespread and commonly misleading advertisements funded by SuperPACs — independent expenditure-only political action committees.

The incredible sums of money donated to candidates and SuperPACs is cause for grave concern.

An Alabama businessman named Shaun McCutcheon, however, disagrees.

McCutcheon is the plaintiff in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Committee, which was heard before the Supreme Court on Tuesday morning.

McCutcheon is challenging the aggregate limits on federal campaign contributions, currently set at $48,600 per year. This means that in a given year, it is illegal to donate more than a combined $48,600 to political candidates.

In an op-ed in Politico published on Sunday, McCutcheon wrote, “Somehow, I can give the individual limit, now $2,600, to 17 candidates without corrupting the system. But as soon as I give that same amount to an 18th candidate, our democracy is suddenly at risk.”

While he means this facetiously, McCutcheon’s statement actually holds some truth.

Completely undoing the limits on individual contributions would of course buy a donor undue influence — something McCutcheon does not disagree with. But why would he want to donate to more than 17 candidates?

Even if Alabama’s seven members of the U.S. House of Representatives and its two U.S. Senate members ran in the same election cycle, that is still only nine candidates — add one more if it’s a presidential election.

McCutcheon undoubtedly wants to provide funding to campaigns around the country in order to change the makeup of the legislative branch. He is a Republican, so he probably wanted to support Republican candidacies for the Senate.

But the purpose of the legislative branch, particularly the House of Representatives, is to provide direct representation for localities in the highest legislative branch.

A citizen of Alabama providing monetary influence in a Congressional race in Idaho, for example, degrades the system. What may be best for the person in Alabama may not be best for the citizens of Idaho, whom their Congressional member is meant to represent.

With record amounts of money pouring into and influencing election results from a handful of people, it would be unwise to allow these same people to donate directly to a myriad of campaigns — they should be forced to pick and choose their battles.

But even if McCutcheon loses in court, he could spread his wealth around the country and influence many different elections through other mechanisms.

There is currently no limit to the amount of money an individual can donate to a SuperPAC and thanks to the Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in Citizen’s United v. Federal Election Committee, Mr. McCutcheon’s company could also donate to political campaigns and SuperPACs.

The decision in Citizen’s United opened the floodgates and health care companies, defense contractors, Wall Street firms and other corporations poured millions of dollars into federal elections.

These companies all had something to gain from getting certain politicians elected. But the interests of wealthy businessmen and the corporations they control should not take precedence over the interests of small business owners, entrepreneurs and individual citizens.

It’s easy for corporations and their executives to make their opinions heard and their influence felt.

Do we really want to make it easier?

McCutcheon’s case has the potential to overturn 39 years of precedent set by Buckley v. Valeo in 1974. This is the only remaining sensible case law regarding campaign finance.

There is already too much money polluting politics. We are supposed to vote with a pencil, not with our wallets.

Michael Hacker is a senior political science major. His column appears weekly. He can be reached at mahacker@syr.edu and followed on Twitter at @mikeincuse.

Published on October 10, 2013 at 12:56 am