Conn. can bar lobbyists from making campaign donations

The AP reports:

A federal judge late last week upheld Connecticut’s ban on lobbyists and state contractors making contributions to state political campaigns.

In a 98-page decision, U.S. District Judge Stefan R. Underhill in Bridgeport on Dec. 19 said the General Assembly was justified in enacting such a ban given Connecticut’s history of public corruption scandals involving high-ranking state politicians.

“I conclude that the legislature had a constitutional, sufficiently important interest in combating actual and perceived corruption by eliminating contributions from individuals with the means and motive to exercise undue influence over elected officials,” Underhill wrote in Green Party v. Garfield.

The judge maintained that the state’s campaign-finance law, which passed in wake of the corruption scandal that drove former Gov. John G. Rowland from office in 2004, does not “materially undermine” lobbyists’ constitutional right to free speech or to freely associate with candidates and political parties.

Some lobbyists at the state Capitol were outraged by the ban, saying they and their family members were unfairly targeted because of the scandal. Besides the lobbyists and state contractors, the law also bans their immediate and minor family members from making political contributions to candidates for legislative and statewide offices, candidate-affiliated political action committees and party committees.

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