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The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA, McCain–Feingold Act, , ) is a United States federal law that amended the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, which regulates the financing of political campaigns. Its chief sponsors were Senators Russ Feingold (D-WI) and John McCain (R-AZ). The law became effective on 6 November 2002, and the new legal limits became effective on January 1, 2003. As noted in ''McConnell v. Federal Election Commission'', a United States Supreme Court ruling on the BCRA, the Act was designed to address two issues: * The increased role of soft money in campaign financing, by prohibiting national political party committees from raising or spending any funds not subject to federal limits, even for state and local races or issue discussion; * The proliferation of issue advocacy ads, by defining as "electioneering communications" broadcast ads that name a federal candidate within 30 days of a primary or caucus or 60 days of a general election, and prohibiting any such ad paid for by a corporation (including non-profit issue organizations such as Right to Life or the Environmental Defense Fund) or paid for by an unincorporated entity using any corporate or union general treasury funds. The decision in ''Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission'' overturns this provision, but not the ban on foreign corporations or foreign nationals in decisions regarding political spending.〔(Electioneering Communications ), Federal Election Commission. January 2010.〕 Although the legislation is known as "McCain–Feingold", the Senate version is not the bill that became law. Instead, the companion legislation, H.R. 2356—introduced by Rep. Chris Shays (R-CT), is the version that became law. Shays–Meehan was originally introduced as H.R. 380. == History of the bill == In the aftermath of Watergate, Congress passed the Federal Election Campaign Act Amendments of 1974, which put new limits on contributions to campaigns.〔 Four years later, the FEC ruled that donors could donate unlimited money to political parties (but not the candidates themselves) if the party used that money for "party building activities" such as voter registration drives, but not to directly support candidates.〔 Both the Republican and Democratic parties nonetheless used this money to support their candidates, and money donated to parties became known as soft money. In 1992, President George H.W. Bush vetoed a bill passed by the Democratic Congress that would have, among other things, restricted the use of soft money. President Clinton pushed for a similar bill, but was unable to get both houses to agree on one bill.〔 In 1995, Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Russ Feingold (D-WI) jointly published an op-ed calling for campaign finance reform, and began working on their own bill.〔 In 1998, the Senate voted on the bill, but the bill failed to meet the 60 vote threshold to defeat a filibuster. All 45 Senate Democrats and 6 Senate Republicans voted to invoke cloture, but the remaining 49 Republicans voted against invoking cloture. This effectively killed the bill for the remainder of the 105th Congress. McCain's 2000 campaign for president and a series of scandals (including the Enron scandal) brought the issue of campaign finance to the fore of public consciousness in 2001.〔 McCain and Feingold pushed the bill in the Senate, while Chris Shays (R-CT) and Marty Meehan (D-MA) led the effort to pass the bill in the House.〔 In the just the second successful use of the discharge petition since the 1980s, a mixture of Democrats and Republicans defied Speaker Dennis Hastert and passed a campaign finance reform bill. The House approved the bill 240-189 vote, sending the bill to the Senate.〔 The bill passed the Senate in a 60-40 vote, the bare minimum required to overcome the filibuster.〔 Throughout the Congressional battle on the bill, President Bush declined to take a strong position, but Bush signed the law in March 2002 after it cleared both houses of Congress. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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