The Council of State Governments—West
Special Report on Legislative Ethics
Beyond the Law
“The five most dangerous words in business may be:
‘everybody else is doing it.’ ”
~ Warren Buffet, quoted in “Financial Times,” October 9, 2006
Download Full Report . This  Special Report on ethics is a product of the Committee on the Future of Western Legislatures, Council of State Governments- WEST (CSG-WEST). Information for the report was developed at an ethics forum held in Portland, Oregon, September 14, 2005.
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Introduction
“The world’s first campaign law didn’t stem from Watergate. It was enacted around 300 BC in Rome. The law made it illegal to artificially whiten one’s toga and so appear more attractive,” writes Brad Rourke, the former vice president of public policy at the Institute for Global Ethics.
Today’s efforts to respond to real and perceived political misbehaviors are much the same as in Rome—have a scandal, pass a law, have another scandal, pass another law and so on.
News media throughout the nation report almost daily on ethical transgressions in the states. “The fix is in for the legislature” reports the Birmingham News. “Amid Scandals, States Overhaul Lobbying Laws” declares the New York Times. “Legislature seeks to recover from embarrassing sting...” writes the Tennessean. “States Offer Grim Look at Curbing Corruption,” laments the Los Angeles Times. And all the while public confidence in government declines. On May 25, 2005, the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania published results from a public opinion survey on the ethics of journalists, lawyers, teachers, government officials and politicians. Teachers came out on top by a wide margin. How did politicians stack up? Fifty-two percent of those surveyed rated the ethics of politicians as either somewhat bad or very bad.
As part of its ongoing commitment to legislative institutions, the CSG-WEST Committee on the Future of Western Legislatures brought Western lawmakers and ethics experts together for a conversation about ethical conflicts and practical resolutions. The result was a growing sense that passing and complying with more ethics laws is not enough. Going “beyond the law” will be necessary to achieve high personal and institutional ethical standards.
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