Elements That Influence State Government Essay

The special interest group we are going to look at is the Sierra Club. The sierra club is a body of volunteers that come together to fight for the environment. This interest group has offices in every state in the union. As we look at the Sierra Club in whole we will describe what this organization stands for and try to define its relationship two each of the political parties and lastly we will look at how the interest groups influences state government. According to Carl Pope, â€Å"We stand for the principle that ordinary people don’t believe that they’re here to use up the earth and have the bank account exhausted when they die; that most people really see the planet as an ongoing enterprise. They’re inspired by nature. They want to leave it behind and they feel responsible for it Pope (2008), (para. 1)†. That being said the sierra club is an organization with of over 750,000 members with a common goal in mind (Pope, 2008). That goal is to protect the earth we live on. What is unique about the sierra club is depending on what state you’re in, the sierra club will come at you in very different ways depending on the cause at hand. This means if you live in California, the sierra club will fight to protect water rights and conservation as well as air pollution. If one lives in Kentucky then the sierra club will fight you on coal while promoting wind industry. The unique thing the sierra club has going for it is that it has many different platform to speak from while fighting for a common goal. One of the ways the sierra club has found to gain support on different issues is to a line its self with different political party to gain the support and win favor with state voters. What this means is that the sierra club leverages power of their net work of volunteers and members in every state for the chance to help elect candidates that are environmentally friendly and in line with the thoughts and values that the sierra club represents. Another way the sierra club has grown in power is that they have endorsed like minded candidates from state, local, and municipal arenas. One of the ways that make the sierra club so effective in endorsing a candidate is the multi step process; each candidate receives before the sierra club will publicly support said candidate. The sierra club generally a lines its self with the Democratic Party because Democratic are more liberal than Republicans. For this reason this organization will give democrat contributions to help a candidate become elected to office. According the sierra club leadership the more like minded officials we have in office the more changes can be to the ongoing fight to help preserve the environment. The sierra club supports Kentucky Representative John Yarmuth Democrat (â€Å"Sierra Club Endorses John Yarmuth†, 2012). One of the reason the sierra club support Representative Yarmuth is because of his views on the environment, energy as well as the Kentucky Clean Water Protection Act. The Republican Party has not so lucky when it come to getting support from the sierra club. According to the Perspective a news letter, in this news letter the sierra club comments on how they do not believe the republicans care about the environment due to their stand on climate change. The perspective go’s o to tell about how thinks there is not enough scientific fact to support the accusation, it is for these types of reason that the sierra club has failed to support Republican candidates material (â€Å"The Republicans, The Sierra Club and the Environment†, 2012). Since the sierra club is disenchanted with the Republican Party they see very little money or contributions of any kind from this organization. So how does a special interest group influence state government? Interest groups are the ones that fund a lot of the politicians’ campaigns, so it’s usually an exchange of some kind of service. The interest groups push for certain legislation to go through the House of Representative, and then the Representative relies on their support in their next election. Organizations like the sierra club can influence government by getting candidates elected that have similar goals. Contributions of money on different issues help with advertizing to help sway voters or to inundate the public with information either for or against a cretin issue. Special interest groups like The Sierra Club has become very crafty in the different way they have found to influence government. Most people do not understand that interest groups don’t just lobby for legislation and wine and dine politicians. They actually write legislation, to give to politicians to sponsor. For example, the legislation popularly known as No Child Left Behind was actually commissioned by and basically written by an interest group called the Business Round Table. Another angle to look at is that interest groups often employ lobbyists who already have working relationships with the members of the House, and so these groups tend to have more influence over the way the legislation is worded. This way the lobbyist can protect and benefit the company or industry they are lobbying for. References Pope, C. (2008). Big Think. Retrieved from http://bigthink.com/ideas/2378 Sierra Club Endorses John Yarmuth. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.kentucky.sierraclub/newsroom The Republicans, the sierra club and the environment. (2012). Retrieved from http://povcrystal.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-republicans-sierra-club-and.html