Conclusion

This conclusion highlights the importance of PACs in twentieth-century American political development. The emergence of partisan PACs, initially formed by major interest groups, played an important and neglected role in fostering the polarization of American politics—a phenomenon that has raised concern in recent decades. Seeking to reconfigure party politics around specific policy issues—more broadly, to realign the party system along an ideological dimension of conflict—these PACs helped make the parties more distinct and more deeply divided over time. They did so via electoral tools and tactics that are now ubiquitous in political life but are rarely probed in scholarship. A focus on PACs thus illuminates the very mechanisms through which party change was brought about, as much as its wider meaning. The book concludes with a consideration of contemporary US politics, in which PACs continue to play a prominent role.

A Labor-Liberal Constellation

This chapter traces the initial diffusion of the PAC concept from the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) to other labor organizations, including the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and liberal ideological groups. Though the AFL had previously opposed the CIO’s partisan electoral strategy and the formation of P.A.C., it came to emulate both following passage of the Taft-Hartley Act by a Republican Congress in 1947, forming Labor’s League for Political Education (LLPE) to engage in elections. That same year, two avowedly “liberal” groups were created to bolster the anti-Communist Left and champion liberal Democrats: the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) and the National Committee for an Effective Congress (NCEC). The chapter traces the intertwined electoral efforts and tactical innovations of these liberal and labor organizations through the AFL-CIO merger in 1955, the subsequent creation of their joint PAC, the Committee on Political Education (COPE), and the latter’s activities in the 1956 elections.

A Tale of Two PACs

This chapter traces the diffusion of the PAC concept from the left to the right of the political spectrum in the late 1950s, with the formation of conservative electoral groups such as the Americans for Constitutional Action (ACA) to counter liberal ones like the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA). By the early 1960s the business community had cast off its earlier resistance to overt electioneering, with the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) forming the Business-Industry Political Action Committee (BIPAC) to channel campaign resources to favored congressional candidates. Though they initially sought to bolster the conservative coalition, these groups soon embraced a dynamic partisan strategy focused on the Republican Party, seeking to shift it rightward much as labor and liberal groups sought to push the Democratic Party to the left. This reactive process culminated in the presidential election of 1964, a contest to which the roots of modern partisan “polarization” are often traced.

When Business Is Not “Businesslike”

This chapter explores the initial resistance to the PAC concept within the business community and among conservatives more generally in the 1940s and 1950s. Though major business groups like the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) and United States Chamber of Commerce had not entirely ignored elections to this point, they concentrated their energies following World War II on lobbying and publicity campaigns promoting “free enterprise,” while criticizing labor and liberal PACs as coercive, collectivist, and antidemocratic. They also placed faith in the “conservative coalition” of Republicans and Southern Democrats to protect their interests, reflecting their strong belief that both parties should and could promote business aims. As fears grew that labor had successfully “infiltrated” the Democratic Party, however, conservative activists urged business groups to be “businesslike” and respond to labor electioneering in kind. Business leaders thus began to contemplate a partisan electoral counterstrategy centered on the Republican Party.

Introducing P.A.C.

This chapter examines the creation of the Congress of Industrial Organizations’ (CIO’s) political action committee or P.A.C. in 1943, following the collapse of Labor’s Non-Partisan League and passage of a new law restricting union money in elections. This was a critical point in the CIO’s embrace of a “dynamic partisan” electoral strategy. Through interventions in primary elections and the targeted provision of general election support to sympathetic Democratic candidates, P.A.C. sought to reshape the Democratic Party along more pro-labor and liberal lines. As this chapter reveals, P.A.C. leaders hoped to elect supportive lawmakers in the 1944 and 1946 elections, seeking out candidates who were strongly committed to labor’s goals. Despite public pronouncements of nonpartisanship, however, they chose not to look for allies on both sides of the aisle, instead favoring liberal Democrats over liberal Republicans—hoping to impress Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal vision onto the Democratic Party as a whole.

Introduction

This introduction highlights the controversial nature and limited extent of interest group electioneering in the early twentieth century compared to its pervasiveness today. When early interest groups did engage in elections, they sought to appear nonpartisan, whereas many contemporary interest groups operate in effect as allies of the major parties. While different generations of political scientists have offered theories that explain each approach to elections and partisanship, they do not explain the shift in interest group behavior apparent across the twentieth century. This introduction provides a developmental account, elaborated in later chapters, that explains the intertwined embrace of electioneering and partisanship among major interest groups in the mid-twentieth century. It recounts when and why these groups formed political action committees (PACs) to undertake these electioneering activities and argues that such PACs have been used to transform the American party system.

“Pressure” as Prologue

This chapter examines the relatively limited involvement of business and labor groups in early twentieth-century elections. Though such groups emphasized lobbying, they might occasionally seek to reward or punish their “friends and enemies” in Congress by mobilizing voters on a “nonpartisan” basis. But as lobbying came to involve appeals to public opinion as a means of persuading lawmakers, the threat of electoral punishment became more prominent. This model of “pressure politics” was perfected by temperance groups like the Anti-Saloon League (ASL) in the 1910s and early 1920s but soon came under strain due to presidential politics. The chapter examines the hesitant involvement of the ASL in the 1928 election amid the rise of a powerful opponent with ties to business leaders: the Association Against the Prohibition Amendment (AAPA). The ASL and AAPA ultimately backed opposing presidential nominees, which challenged nonpartisan pretensions and played out differently for each side.

“Interests” and Elections

This empirical chapter draws on a series of congressional investigations into election campaigns and lobbying conducted between 1912 and 1957 (plus additional data on the early 1960s) to identify interest groups and related organizations—including early PACs—that participated in elections during this period. The major groups so identified—primarily business organizations, labor unions, and ideological groups—form the spine of the narrative throughout the book. This chapter highlights changes in their major organizational features and electoral practices over time. Furthermore, it explores the controversies surrounding both political parties and “special interests” in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, particularly concerning the influx of money into election campaigns, which prompted these congressional investigations in the first place. It also offers an overview of campaign finance legislation and reforms that Congress passed in response.

Electoral Afterlives

This chapter considers Labor’s Non-Partisan League (LNPL) and the Liberty League after the 1936 election campaign. Both remained in existence for several years, though the Liberty League was far less active. Meanwhile, the LNPL shifted its sights from electing the president to electing his supporters in Congress. In so doing, its actions took on a more partisan hue, for most LNPL support went to liberal Democrats and few, if any, progressive Republicans. It also opposed some conservative Southern Democrats, suggesting a nascent interest in partisan change—something President Roosevelt had himself encouraged with his 1938 “purge” campaign, when he urged defeat of his most bitter Democratic critics in their primary elections. Especially after 1938, CIO leaders began to look beyond a strategy of “rewarding and punishing” to envisaging a cohesive, disciplined, and supportive Democratic Party as a vehicle through which labor’s aims could best be achieved over the long term.

A Tale of Two Leagues

This chapter recounts a significant shift in interest group behavior during the 1930s, as the presidency of Franklin Roosevelt and his New Deal policies sparked intense political conflict over the power and reach of the federal government. Prominent labor and business groups took opposing sides in this conflict, which mobilized them politically in new ways. This chapter looks particularly at the 1936 election, when campaign groups associated with the labor and business communities—Labor’s Non-Partisan League (LNPL) and the Liberty League—squared off in the presidential contest. In key ways, these groups appear much like proto-PACs: they signaled a more assertive approach to elections and pumped large amounts of money into campaigns in support of opposing party nominees. Nonetheless, the LNPL and the Liberty League still tried to justify their electoral support in “nonpartisan” terms by emphasizing individual candidates rather than parties, reflecting lingering controversy over interest group electioneering.