U.S. Election Campaigns: A Documentary and Reference Guide

This book provides an analytical guide to the modern political campaign, chronologically covering key federal, state, and local campaign laws, election commission rules, and the court decisions interpreting them.

While the media and the public tend to focus on the personalities and foibles of the candidates and the horse-race elements of political campaigns, election outcomes often depend as much on the rules that limit candidates' activities and advertising as on the candidates' platforms and personal appeal. How much money may candidates raise? From whom can they accept money? When and how may they spend their campaign funds? What are they allowed to say in their ads?

Informed voters who understand the constraints under which campaigns operate can see past the headlines and the hype to assess the quality of the candidates' campaign decisions and their management skills. The approximately 100 documents gathered in this reference guide put the essential information in readers' hands.

After introducing 18th- and 19th-century efforts to regulate American election campaigns, this book examines the 20th-century evolution and refinement of election campaign laws in era-by-era chapters and concludes with a chapter on 21st-century developments. Each chapter opens with a short essay highlighting politically relevant historical events of the era to place the subject matter in context.

Kyle L. Kreider is professor of political science at Wilkes University, USA. With Thomas J. Baldino, he has coauthored Of the People, by the People, for
the People: A Documentary Record of Voting Rights and Electoral Reform (Greenwood, 2010) and U.S. Election Campaigns: A Documentary and Reference Guide (Greenwood, 2011) and
coedited Minority Voting in the United States (Praeger, 2016).