Any move to weaken parties will automatically make interest groups more powerful, he said in his testimony. Munger said that, besides making it harder for special interests to dominate the political process, parties are also more accountable because they must face voters in subsequent elections.
Parties are the antidote to narrow, particular interests.
If private interests are forced to accept a broad scope of conflict, in a public forum, in a contest between encompassing visions of governance, their power is sharply reduced. Current laws also stymie third parties because unlike the Democrats and Republicans, which receive their public funds before an election, minor parties get their money afterwards and only if they receive at least 5 percent of the total national vote. As a result, Munger's testimony concluded, contributions to parties should be private and completely unregulated, except for strong and clear disclosure requirements. Soft money contributions have, according to some experts, become a widely abused source of funds for parties in federal campaigns, and are not subject to the same limits or requirements. Munger strongly opposes this legislation.