The Chautauquan Daily: Campaign Legal Center Founder Kicked off Week 2 Theme, ‘Money and Power’
President and Founder of the Campaign Legal Center Trevor Potter kicked off Week Two’s theme “Money and Power” at 10:45 a.m. on the Fourth of July in the Amphitheater by discussing his views on campaign finance reform and how America can reduce the influence money has on politics in the government today.
Potter’s lecture was based on Benjamin Franklin’s response to what form of government the founders were creating during 1787’s Constitutional Convention. Potter said a woman asked Franklin what type of government the nation would have, and he responded, “A republic — if you can keep it.”
“We Americans have been trying to keep our republic ever since,” Potter said. “Through two centuries of domestic and international turmoil, our country has not only seen wars, political upheavals and economic disasters at home and abroad, but also along with these crises, a continuous renewal and expansion of democracy.”