ABSTRACT
More specific opinions are nested in greater, more inclusive outlooks; how one views a proposal for government-provided medical care depends on one’s broader views about individual responsibility and the role and effectiveness of government. Embarrassed by all the events at and after Watergate, Republicans could do little to resist the massive reforms of 1974 promoted both by the Democratic party and a mass opinion organized by the emerging Common Cause. The result was the rewriting of the Federal Election Campaign Act that is today’s regulation of congressional campaign finance. Even less clear than the outlines of mass opinion about campaign finance is the distribution of the opinion in various groups and segments of the national population. The political truth is that opinion on campaign finance is largely unorganized and immobilized. The polls dealt too generally with campaign finance, the trial court ruled; only evidence of negative public attitudes created specifically by the statutory section under question would apply.
