Putting on the Candidates: The Use of Television in Presidential Elections

Abstract

The next presidential election campaign on television is likely to feature many spot commercials for the candidates, short news clips of candidates in on-site appearances staged for television, unanswered addresses to the nation or news conferences by the incumbent, relatively limited opportunities for the principal candidates to address the electorate, and, until the last moment, uncertainty about whether the candidates will appear face-to-face in debates. This use of television in presidential campaigns may have negative effects, including unfairly favoring wealthy interests and incumbents, encouraging political factionalism, and placing pressures on broadcasters that threaten First Amendment principles. The public would be better served by permitting broadcasters to present the two leading candidates without having to provide equal time to all other candidates; by giving the principal candidates television time during the campaign to address the electorate; by the adoption of party rules requiring that candidates participate in televised presidential debates; and by encouraging the use of new communications technologies to provide additional political information to the voters.

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References

1. Public Opinion, p. 55 (Dec.-Jan. 1985).

2. Washington Post, national weekly ed., 5 Nov. 1984, p. 6.

3. 47 U.S.C. § 312(a)(7).

Irving Gastfreund and Erwin Krasnow , eds., Political Broadcasting Handbook, 2d ed. (Washington, DC: National Association of Broadcasters, 1984).

5. Political Broadcast Catechism, 10th ed. (Washington, DC: National Association of Broadcasters, 1984), pp. 62, 88; “Commission Policy in Enforcing Section 312(a)(7) of the Communications Act,” 43 Radio Reg. 2d 1029 (1978).

6. Broadcasters are required to sell time to federal candidates at the “lowest unit rate” available to commercial advertisers. 47 U.S.C. § 315(b).

7. See, for example, CBS, Inc. v. FCC, 49 Radio Reg 2d 1191 (U.S. Sup. Ct. 1981).

8. Ronald Brownstein , “Public Seeing Campaign through Eye of TV Cameras,” National Journal, 22 Sept. 1984, pp. 1752-1757.

9. Newton N. Minow , John Bartlow Martin , and Lee M. Mitchell , Presidential Television (New York: Basic Books, 1973).

10.

10. Denis Steven Rutkus , “President Reagan, the Opposition and Access to Network Airtime” (Report, Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, 1984), app. A.

11.

11. Ibid., p. 7.

12.

12. 47 U.S.C. § 315.

13.

Joel Swerdlow , Beyond Debate: A Paper on Televised Presidential Debates (New York: Twentieth Century Fund, 1983).

14.

ibid., 13 May 1985, p. 58.

15.

15. 26 U.S.C. § 9001 et seq.

16.

16. 26 U.S.C. § 9012(f)(i); see FEC v. National Conservative Political Action Committee, 105 S. Ct. 1459 (1985).

17.

ibid. (Feb.-Mar. 1985).

18.

18. Presidential Election Campaign Fund Act, 26 U.S.C. §§ 9002-4; 11 C.F.R. §§ 9002-4.

19.

19. Communications Daily, 31 Jan. 1984.

20.

20. According to Walter Mondale's campaign manager, whose candidate used satellite hookups to appear at meetings with campaign supporters: “If the name of the game is to be seen by as many people as possible, you can be seen by a helluva lot more people with a satellite at 28,000 miles than you can from a bus at 60 miles per hour. It's going to be the wave of the future in presidential politics.”Washington Journalism Review, p. 50 (June 1985).