Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, June 12, 1973
Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, June 12, 1973
[00.14.21] [Continued opening statement of Maurice Stans] What I want, particularly to stress in this opening statement is the fact that this committee cannot effectively evaluate the work of the finance committee or my own activities without having in mind four fundamental distinctions": 1. The distinction between the functions and activities of the campaign committee and the functions and activities of the finance committee. 2. The, distinction between the election financing law which expired on April 6, 1972, and the new election financing law which was effective on April 7, 1972. 3. Within the finance committee, the distinction between the functions and activities or the chairman and the, functions and activities of the treasurer. 4. The, activities of the, finance committee before I joined it on February 15, 1972, and the activities of that committee after February 15, 1972. By the campaign committee I mean, of course, the Coin Committee for the Re-Election of the President. By the finance committee I mean the Finance Committee for the Re-Election of the President and its several predecessors up to April 6, 1972, and the Finance Committee to Re-Elect the President beginning April 7, 1972, together with their associated committees in each time frame,. During the period of my affiliation with the finance committee as its chairman, the treasurer was Hugh Sloan, Jr., until July 15, 1972, and thereafter the treasurer was Paul E. Barrick. I shall refer to the, treasurer as though it were the same individual, letting the time period identify which of these persons it relates to. Now, as between the campaign committee and the finance committee, the campaign committee had all of the responsibility for the planning of the campaign, the, development of its strategy and the execution of its tactics. The questions of bow many people to employ, the efforts to be expended in each State, the, determination of the relative use of direct mail, personal solicitation and media advertising, the kinds of appeals to voters, and the entire gamut of the political effort was developed, organized, managed and conducted by the campaign committee. In effect, their decisions fixed the, amount the campaign would cost. The finance committee had no part in any of these basic decisions. The role of the finance committee was directed toward a single objective--to raise enough money to pay the bills. The finance committee had nothing to say about which bills to incur. Under the arrangements in effect, the finance committee paid any bill or made any payment which bore the approval of an appropriate official of the campaign committee. The campaign committee was supposed to see that the amounts it OK'd were within the limits of an approved budget. It turned out that the controls did not work as they were intended, and spending overran the budget by more than $8 million, perhaps more likely $10 million. So, in practical terms, the two committees operated in watertight compartments. They were physically separated on different floors. The campaign committee ran the campaign and created the debts, the finance committee raised the money, paid the bills. There was only one forum for the exchange of opinions with respect to campaign Spending, and that was the budget committee. The budget committee consisted of three officials of the campaign committee and three officials of the finance committee. Formal meetings of the budget committee with recorded minutes did not take place until after Labor Day, 1972. A number of informal meetings on budget, matters were held before that, but most of those centered on the overall amount of funding at the National and State levels. The meetings of the budget, committee were not, in my opinion, very effective. Each one was opened by me with a general statement of the current cash position and the expectations of future contributions , which until the last few days of the campaign never equaled the expected spending. I pressed continuously for reductions, in Over spending, but the actual trend was constantly upward: At times, meetings became bitter, and I walked Out Of one meeting at which I thought there was absolutely no understanding of the difficulties of fundraising on the part, of those who were doing the spending. The budget grew to $40 million, then $43 million, and ended up in excess of $48 million find our latest accounting, which is not yet completed, shows it to be in excess of $50 million, Only a late surge of contributions as a result, of the effective organization we had built across the country, made it possible for us to end up with a surplus above that. Now, as between the, old law and the new law, prior to April 7, 1972, the controlling law on candidates for Federal office was the Corrupt Practices Act enacted in 1925. This act, made, a major distinction between fundraising for a candidate to secure a nomination--through primaries or conventions--and fundraising in a general election. There was no reporting required of any kind on contributions and expenditures to secure a nomination There was a requirement that contributions and expenditures in a general election be reported to the Clerk of the House. [00.20.40]