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Friday, July 15, 2011

Law - More on: NPR investigation of ALEC, "the birthplace of a thousand pieces of legislation introduced in statehouses across the county"

Remember this ILB entry from Oct. 29, 2010?

On July 13, 2011, Tom Hamburger and Neela Banerjee, of the Washington Bureau of the LA Times, had a long story headlined "State legislative bills raise conservative group's profile: The nonprofit American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, made up of conservative state lawmakers and corporate executives, crafted the language that has resulted in similar legislation in several states. Watchdog groups are scrutinizing the organization's practices."

The story under the long headline begins:

In late January, the Indiana House of Representatives adopted a resolution asking Congress to compel the Environmental Protection Agency to stop regulating carbon emissions, declaring that "EPA over-regulation is driving jobs and industry out of America." Almost identical resolutions have won at least partial approval in a dozen other states, from Virginia to Michigan to Wyoming.

And it's no coincidence that the language of these resolutions is similar, describing EPA's plans to curb air pollution as a "train wreck" that will harm the economy.

In each case, the basic text of the resolutions sprang not from state capitols but from a relatively little-known, Washington-based nonprofit group called the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC. Composed of more than 1,500 conservative state legislators and executives of some of the nation's biggest corporations, ALEC collects millions of dollars in corporate contributions to generate a steady stream of bills and resolutions for state action.

Topics include reducing government regulation, privatizing government services and requiring voters to show proof of identity at polling places.

On Wednesday, a Wisconsin-based liberal activist group, the Center for Media and Democracy, released thousands of pages of internal ALEC documents, including model bills, emails and details of the organization's internal procedures, which give private-sector representatives a major role in drafting proposed legislation.

"Dozens of corporations are paying millions of dollars a year to write business-friendly legislation that is becoming law in statehouses from coast to coast," said Bob Edgar, a former Democratic congressman from Pennsylvania who is currently president of Common Cause, the government watchdog group.

Common Cause plans to challenge ALEC's nonprofit status, arguing that it spends most of its resources lobbying, in violation of the rules governing nonprofit organizations. * * *

Legislators from every state are members of ALEC, many of them top GOP officials who champion the group's causes.

The Indiana bill, for example, was introduced by Republican state Rep. David Wolkins, who is co-chair of ALEC's Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force. In Virginia, state Delegate James W. "Will" Morefield said he took the EPA resolution verbatim from the ALEC website after it had been presented to him by the coal industry, according to the Virginian-Pilot newspaper.

And here is the press release from Common Cause, headed "ALEC Bills Expose Corporate Drive to Advance Business Over Public Interest." It begins:
Today’s release of more than 800 “model” bills and resolutions drafted and promoted by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) opens a window to the workings of a powerful and secretive corporate front group that has enlisted thousands of state lawmakers to pass legislation on its behalf, often in conflict with the public good, Common Cause said today.
The ILB is trying to locate the list of 800 bills.

Also of interest is this July 14, 2011 release headed "Common Cause seeks IRS audit of corporate/legislative group: Letter cites lobbying by American Legislative Exchange Council," and particularly the appended 65-page letter to the IRS.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 15, 2011 10:33 AM
Posted to General Law Related