Judges: the new target for interest groups

While we’ve been talking how interest groups can try to influence politicians to achieve their goals. Mother Jones points out that politicians aren’t the only ones making the rules or being influenced to change them. Judges are just as susceptible to being influenced by interest groups. Many laws in America are made my court cases than by actual legislation passed in congress. The article describes how interest groups have been funding money into judge’s elections who seem to rule in their favor. The hard part about funding politicians is that more people pay attention to their races, meanwhile most people in a constituency would not know much about the judges in their area if it weren’t for the ad that the interest groups pay for. With the opposition less informed there is less opposition and more of an opportunity for interest groups to get their regulations passed.

 

Becker may be right by saying that in the political sector the opposition will be big enough to work together and stop interest groups from influencing politicians unless it’s beneficial to all. However in race like judgeships where most of the opposition abstains, this means that although “n” includes the people taxed, those taxed do not also equal a vote. Whereas the number of people in the interest group more than likely equal a vote. That way the risk of investing the money in a candidate is lower, leading it to be a better alternative route for interest groups to invest their money in. If this system remains unchecked then maybe we should be worried like Olson believed.