Government Ethics Cases For State Legislators

These brief case studies were prepared by a meeting of the 2015 Upper Midwest Ethics and Leadership Summit.  All public officials depicted are fictitious and any resemblance to actual politicians is entirely coincidental.

1. As the state assemblywoman toured her district, many grateful citizens pressed gifts upon her: a scarf here, a plaque there, and an occasional bottle of locally made wine. When the assemblywoman expressed great satisfaction over a sip of chardonnay at one stop, the vintner said, “You will never go without as long as you are in office.”  The following month, and every month for the last six, an elegantly packaged gift box with two bottles of wine has been delivered to the assemblywoman’s office. The winemaker has now hired a lobbyist to oppose a proposed regulation limiting the marketing of alcoholic beverages.  The assemblywoman has not interrupted the wine deliveries. The fair market value of the wine does not reach the reportable level and the assemblywoman often shares the bottles with staff.

    

2. A state senator has a group of eight old friends who spend an annual boating weekend at the home of one of the friends. The weekend host and his wife are wealthy and generous, and always put on an elegant spread for the group.  The host has just indicated to the senator that he plans to bid on a significant state contract for the first time.  The senator RSVPs that he will again attend the annual house party.

    

3. State Representative Smith has always been pro-business and was successful in getting legislation passed establishing a state board tasked with awarding government incentive grants for businesses. Prior to introducing this legislation Smith invested in ABC Corporation, a business that could potentially benefit from one of these grants.  His financial interest in the company has always been disclosed, but Smith did not recuse himself from the debate or the vote on the legislation.  ABC applied for and received a grant.  Representative Smith was not on the board that makes the grant decisions, nor did he advocate on behalf of ABC’s grant application.

    

4. Assemblyman Jones is much beloved and has been in office for many years. He knows everyone and everyone knows him.  He is up for reelection this year, and he asks his campaign manager to send out an email invitation to “everyone in his district” to a campaign kickoff barbeque and fundraising event.  Fred is the campaign staffer who gets the assignment. He wonders how he is going to get the email addresses for everyone in the district.  He ponders this question over beers with his friend Lola who is one of the Assemblyman’s government staffers. If the Assemblyman approves, Lola offers to help by giving Fred access to the database that contains the email addresses of anyone who has ever emailed the Assemblyman’s government office.   She also gives him the government email addresses of everyone on the government staff. 

    

5. Senators Green and Sloan were old friends from law school days.  They have supported each other politically and are passionate about the same policy goals.  Recently this passion turned into more than shared political agendas, and they began to have an affair.  Both Green and Sloan are married. Rumors about their relationship began to fly as the senators were seen spending so much time together. A blogger who is known for digging up dirt on politicians has asked for an interview.  Fearing the impact on their families if the affair is revealed, Black and Sloan issue a preemptive statement to the press denying that their relationship is anything more than professional.

    

6. State Representative Anderson won her last re-election by a very close margin. The reason for the close call was an October revelation that in a previous run she had received campaign donations from a constituent of Middle Eastern descent who later was proved to have funded organizations accused of terrorism.  Anderson denied any knowledge of the contributor’s alliances when she received the donation, and she was able to quell the scandal. Recently her scheduler was approached by a group of Arab American constituents who would like to meet with Representative Anderson about sponsoring minimum wage legislation. Anderson is on the fence about the legislation but doesn’t want to be seen with any Middle Eastern groups as it might revive the scandal and impact her next campaign.  She tells her scheduler to make up an excuse and decline the meeting.

    

7. Senator Stanislaw has a constituent in his district who always has an axe to grind about something. Lately the constituent has taken to filing broadly worded public record requests asking for all documents about various subjects. The requests always include a demand for all staff emails.  The record requests are so burdensome, his staffers have to devote virtually all of their time responding to this one citizen’s requests to the detriment of other public business. Claiming that it is a matter of efficiency, the senator has decided to engage in what he calls good email hygiene.  He announces to his staff a new office policy whereby all staffers must delete emails that are older than 30 days.  There is no law in the senator’s state to prohibit this practice.

     

8. In his “real life,” the Senate president owns a chain of small grocery stores that spread across the state. He recently encouraged his friend, a newly elected senator, to introduce legislation that would forbid “big box stores” from selling groceries. The Senate president will presumably recuse himself, but he mentioned to the junior senator that he would make sure that the bill is assigned to a “friendly” committee.

    

9. Senator Jackson is facing term limits and has decided to retire from politics at the end of her term. She has always been a strong proponent of education and a strong advocate for increased funding for community colleges in her state.  She learns that the president of the community college where she lives is retiring.  Deciding that this is her dream job, she asks her communications director to hold a press conference in her Senate office so she can tell the press of her intent to apply for the position when she is no longer in office. The timing of her announcement corresponds with the state budgeting process.

    

10. The assemblyman’s young advisors have convinced him to establish a Twitter account to communicate regularly with the public. He has done so, but to control the conversation, he directed his staff to block certain critical members of the press from following him.   The media has demanded to know who is currently approved and who is blocked; he has refused to release the list.

     

11. A generous campaign donor approaches State Senator Blackwell with information that Blackwell’s political opponent has a rocky marriage. The donor insists that the information was received from a trusted source and strongly encourages the senator to leak the news to the press.  Blackwell’s opponent is running on a “family values platform.”  Blackwell has a staffer go to the press.

     

12. You are running for reelection and one of your opponents has just announced that she will not sign any pledges or answer any questionnaires propounded by special interest groups because to do so will tie her hands later and leave her without the benefit of hearing from all sides of a legislative issue. She calls upon all candidates in the race to do the same.  A prerequisite to receiving endorsements from a number of these special interest groups is to first answer their questionnaires.  The other candidate in the race is answering as many questionnaires as he can.  The press is now asking you if you will be as civic minded as the opponent who is refusing to answer questionnaires. You decide to answer the questionnaires.

Kirk O. Hanson is the executive director of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics.  Hana S. Callaghan is the Center’s director of government ethics.

September 2015