Campaign Finance Reform – Massachusetts

This Massachusetts law was passed by ballot initiative in 1998, but repealed by the legislature as part of a budget package in 2003. Governor Mitt Romney and legislators argued that expenditures for public finance of campaigns could not be justified in a time of state budget shortfalls.

Inaddition to providing public financing to candidates who raised a qualifying number of in-state contributions, the law closed the soft money loophole by eliminating unlimited transfers of cash from national parties to state parties and requiring electronic disclosure of all campaign contributions to candidates and political committees. We link below to the new campaign finance law.