From the Champaign News-Gazette: 
 
Business group needs to come clean on campaign funds
 
December 9, 2005 
 
Editorial
 
A business group that donated to the Republican candidate in last year's Illinois Supreme Court race needs to disclose the source of campaign contributions.

Last week, the Justice For All Foundation, a shadowy group created to spend $561,000 on behalf of a Democratic candidate for the Illinois Supreme Court last year, finally detailed where the money came from. To the surprise of few, all of the contributions that were supposed to help Gordon Maag get elected to the Supreme Court came from five law firms — two in east Alton, two in St. Louis and one in South Carolina.

Under a settlement of a complaint filed with the Illinois State Board of Elections by the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, the Justice For All Foundation voluntarily disclosed where it got its money for Maag's unsuccessful race. That's the way campaign disclosure is supposed to work, although it's suppose to be a lot more timely than a year after the election.

Illinois' campaign disclosure laws often have been described as the Wild West of election laws — there are few limits on who can give to what. But nearly all contributions and expenditures have to be disclosed. That was the problem with the Justice For All Foundation. It gave money to a subsidiary
group but never disclose all the donors for the lump sum, an apparent attempt to circumvent disclosure laws.

That group wasn't alone. Maag's Republican opponent in the southern Illinois district, Lloyd Karmeier, had the support of a similar organization - the Illinois Coalition for Jobs, Growth & Prosperity - that raised an estimated $445,000 or more for him.

There's uncertainty about the figure because the business group didn't disclose where it's money came from either. It's still stonewalling, claiming it doesn't know how much of the money it collected last year went to Karmeier.

"It's impossible to legitimately report who gave the money that made it into the political process," Illinois Coalition spokesman Doug Whitley told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "It's like vegetable soup." Therein lies the rub: Whitley acknowledged that the business group collected money that was used in the political process but was not reported.

And it's not like the executives at the Illinois Coalition for Jobs, Growth & Prosperity were political neophytes. Whitley is head of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce, is a former revenue department director and has been part of the Springfield scene for 30 years. The treasurer of the group is Greg Baise, head of the Illinois Manufacturers Association and a former state transportation secretary. The chairman of the group is Ron Gidwitz, a Republican candidate for governor.

These men, who all profess that they want clean government in Illinois, should know better. They need to come clean, disclose the sources of the money to (now) Justice Karmeier, and stop making a mockery out of Illinois' campaign disclosure laws.