Campaign rules need clarification

For 117 years, the Washington Education Association has been a leader in the political arena for public education. In 1915, for example, WEA backed legislation strengthening certification requirements for teachers. Since the 1920s we've led statewide initiative campaigns for school funding.

And, as the Seattle P-I reported last month, the WEA, with its national and local affiliates, was the state's top campaign contributor in the 2006 election cycle. Most notably, we contributed some $900,000 to defeat Initiative 920, the estate tax repeal, thereby preserving $100 million a year for education priorities such as K-12 class-size reduction and access to higher education.

The P-I has also reported that the U.S. Supreme Court will soon hear a case involving the WEA and state campaign finance laws. An important balance of First Amendment rights is at issue. The court will decide if, in trying to ensure that no person is compelled to fund political activity against his or her wishes, our state has imposed on organizations rules so costly and complex that they threaten one's right to join with others in collective participation in the political process.

Whatever the high court decides regarding the constitutionality of Washington's campaign regulations, we are confident the record will show that WEA made scrupulous efforts to fully comply with a seriously flawed law.

The case stems from complaints filed by the Evergreen Freedom Foundation, an organization whose founder was a principal author of the law in question. It is a vague and poorly written set of rules. The first judge to hear the case now on appeal confessed that even he lacked sufficient understanding to issue compliance guidelines. The state Public Disclosure Commission has offered differing, shifting and conflicting interpretations since the law passed in 1992.

This regulatory ambiguity provides EFF limitless opportunities to file complaints and lawsuits as a tactic to silence WEA's advocacy for public education. EFF's manipulation of the incoherent rules at one point resulted in sanctions from a Thurston County Superior Court for litigating in "bad faith." "The courtroom is not a ballpark" the judge wrote, and "a trial is not a ball game."

It's not surprising then, that EFF now wildly misrepresents the issues involved in the case before the Supreme Court. EFF proclaims that review by the high court provides "hope to millions of teachers across the country that they may no longer may be forced to pay union dues that fund political causes with which they disagree ... the Court will have an opportunity to make it clear that no one should be forced to pay for a political cause with which they disagree."

In fact, the Washington Supreme Court found that "there is no indication or argument that WEA is compelling non-members to support political activities or preventing non-members from asserting their First Amendment rights," and that WEA provides a "simple and convenient" process for individuals to opt out of political spending in full accord with previous U.S. Supreme Court rulings. Furthermore, the impact of any decision will be limited to Washington state, where it will pertain to less than 4 percent of the 83,000 educators WEA represents.

We are hopeful the Supreme Court will uphold the decision in our favor. But if instead the justices determine Washington's campaign rules are constitutional, the matter will be sent back for state courts to sort out narrower technical issues. Either way, WEA trusts the judicial process to finally clarify Washington's murky campaign regulations, thereby allowing educators to exercise our fundamental right to collective participation in the political process.

Charles Hasse is a fourth-grade teacher serving as president of the Washington Education Association.

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