High Costs of Winning—And Losing

ESSAY High Costs ofWinning—And Losing by Thad Beyle he shift from party-centered campaigns to candidate-centered campaigns has contributed to the escalation ofthe costs ofrunning for elective office in the United States. In the modern era, heavy use oftelevision, radio, and direct mail has emerged as the primary means with which to communicate with voters.1 As political scientist Frank Sorauf observed, "Nothing characterizes the new era as vividly as die increase in sheer sums of money spent in campaigns for public office."2 Nowhere is cost escalation more evident than in gubernatorial elections in the southern states. But candidate-centered campaigns have long been a hallmark of southern politics, especially when the Democratic Party dominated die region. With the increase in successful Republican runs for governor, southern gubernatorial politics has merely shifted from one-party candidate-centered politics to two-party candidate-centered politics. It is not clear that all the money spent in these high-cost campaigns is well spent. One southern political consultant observed: "Everyone knows that half the money spent in a political campaign is wasted. The trouble is that no one knows which half!"' Unfortunately, there are few data on the costs of campaigns prior to 1 977, the time when most states began to collect campaign finance data. It is possible, however , to examine the costs over the two decades since that year, as I have done below. In order to draw comparisons across the twenty-one-year span, I have converted the costs of each state's gubernatorial election into 1996 dollars.4 TWENTY-ONE YEARS IN THE SOUTH The graph below presents the total costs ofgubernatorial elections in fourteen southern states between 1977 and 1997, with the costs ofthese elections grouped by four election years. The earliest point (77—80) is the total spent in the 1977, 71 1978, 1979» ?98° elections; the second point (78—81) represents the total spent in the 1978, 1979, 1980, 1981 elections; and die last point (94-97) represents the total spent in the 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1997 elections. The costs of southern gubernatorial elections have changed dramatically over the twenty-one-year period. The first six points in the graph, representing the 1977-1985 elections, cluster closely in the $180 to $195 million range. The 1986 and 1990 elections jump into the $240 to $260 million range. In the mid-1990s, the costs ofgubernatorial elections have been backing off to the $200 million to $217 million range, as indicated in the final four points in the figure. Clearly, modern candidate-centered, high-cost campaign strategies entered die scene in the Soudi in die mid-1980s. What is it about those election years that drove the costs of these campaigns up? The 1986 gubernatorial elections in just a few states shed some light on this question. In Florida the costs of the 1986 gubernatorial election approached 560 percent of the 1982 election costs; eighteen candidates spent more than $44 million seeking the open seat vacated by Bob Graham. The Alabama election cost over 150 percent more than it had in 1982; seven candidates spent over $14 million competing for retiring George Wallace's seat. In Tennessee, election costs jumped by 85 percent over 1982's costs as eight candidates spent more than $20 million vying for the open seat vacated by Lamar Alexander. The cost of the Texas gubernatorial election increased by nearly one-third over that of the 1982 election as an incumbent governor was voted out ofoffice. Two aspects of these 1986 elections stand out: there were open seats in three of the four states, and in each state the election resulted in a partisan shift in the governor's office. The 1990 elections were similar in some states. In Georgia, for instance, ten candidates spent nearly $30 million vying for the seat vacated byJoe Frank Harris —nearly seventeen times more than was spent in 1986. In Oklahoma, fourteen candidates spent nearly $1 1 million seeking the seat vacated by Henry Bellmon— doubling the costs of the 1986 election. And again, in Texas, fifteen candidates spent nearly $60 million chasing after the chair that Bill Clements was leaving. In all three...