By John-Henry Westen
WASHINGTON, April 10, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A bill which has already been passed in the US Senate and which has companion bills being put forward in the House, is of great concern to pro-life and pro-family groups in the United States. The bill, the Legislative Transparency and Accountability Act of 2006 (S2349), is being referred to as a gag law for lobbyists and worse, as a damper to grass roots activism.
Douglas Johnson, legislative director of National Right to Life in Washington spoke to LifeSiteNews.com about the legislation.“Several different bills of this type are moving through Congress right now,” said Johnson, noting also that one of them is expected to come to the House floor the week of April 24.
Johnson pointed out that S2349 which passed the Senate 90-8 on March 29, “would regulate for the first time grassroots activism.” The bill defines ‘grassroots lobbying’ as “the voluntary efforts of members of the general public to communicate their own views on an issue to federal officials or to encourage other members of the general public to do the same.”
“The bill does not start off by regulating all constituent contacts with members of Congress,” said Johnson.“But it does adopt that premise that that is a type of lobbying.”Â
The legislation will hamper the pro-life movement and other grassroots based movements since “it imposes a first wave of regulations on groups that encourage members of the public to communicate with their elected officials,” said Johnson.“The encouragement by groups such as ours to inspire of motivate people to write to their congressmen about pending legislation, that’s what they want to start out regulating,” he said.
“We dispute the whole premise,” said NRLC’s legislative director, “in a democracy, when a constituent contacts his or her federal representative, that’s not lobbying that’s just democracy, it isn’t something that should be subject to the regulation of politicians.”
“The justification for the legislation,” explained Johnson, “is to address well-heeled lobbyists taking legislators on junkets and giving them gifts.” However, he added, “this is really an agenda that certain groups like Common Cause use to restrict grassroots democracy so certain privileged elites will have more influence on public policy.”
Johnson noted that the language restricting encouragement of grassroots activism is not yet in the House bill, “but the Democrats are attempting to insert it.”Â
He noted also that the House bill places new burdens on lobbyists as well. Were these restrictions to pass into law, said Johnson, “it would be much more difficult to convey the pro-life movement’s position to members of the Congress.”
The final bill will be written jointly in a House/Senate Congress committee later this Spring.
NRLC suggests that the public express, to House and Senate representatives, opposition to this type of democratic activity being regulated and burdened even more than it already is.
See S2349 online here:
https://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:S.2349.ES:::