Jon S. Corzine: “Today the Senate approved historic legislation that will change the way we manage our democracy in the new century. The…”

“Today the Senate approved historic legislation that will change the way we manage our democracy in the new century. The changes called for in the McCain-Feingold/Shays-Meehan legislation are long overdue and vitally important to restoring the integrity of our electoral process. For the past several years, the amount of unregulated soft money in our campaign system has reached staggering proportions. Soft money has had the insidious effect of holding too many political candidates accountable to large individual donors rather than the people they are elected to represent. In the 1999-2000 campaign season, $495.1 million poured into the coffers of both the Democrats and the Republicans. This was a truly bipartisan problem, and now we have a truly bipartisan solution. Soft money was a scourge on our political process that we are much better off without. Before I go further, let me express my gratitude to two brave Senators: Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and John McCain of Arizona.”