Net Lobbying Grows Up

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March 27, 1998 (12:00 AM EST)

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By John Borland,

A few days before a critical congressional vote on encryption policy last September, House Commerce Committee members' telephones began ringing with thousands of insistent calls. On the line were constituents of the lawmakers, angry about the FBI's attempt to weaken domestically produced encryption software. Many had been persuaded to call by an e-mail bulletin sent out by a pro-encryption advocacy coalition, containing information targeted at each caller's representative in the House.

The committee voted against the FBI proposal. Though the e-mail campaign had not been solely responsible -- other influences, including the traditional lobbying of high-tech businesses, had helped temporarily check the FBI's lobbying in that particular committee -- it was evidence of the Net's growing maturity as a tool of considerable political influence.

"Relative to the speed things usually move in this town, it's a really rapid change," says Oron Strauss, whose Net.Capital firm produces an e-mail and legislative database tool to help interest groups direct supporters' contacts.

Advocates have long maintained Web pages and e-mail lists for supporters. The Net has hummed with political speech as long as bulletin boards and e-mail have existed. But until recently, these activities have largely been dismissed as marginal by most political professionals. Cyberspace outrage meant little in terms of changing votes in Capitol hallways, where the currency of persuasion remains personal relationships and pecuniary power. Campaign consultants saw Web pages as interesting appendages, but found them little use in reaching the key swing voters in hard-fought campaigns.

Like everything in the online world, that's changing. Net-based lobbyists are moving beyond e-mail and static Web pages to develop more sophisticated Net strategies for making themselves heard on Capitol Hill.

And increasingly, legislators are listening.

An American University survey taken early this year found 97 percent of federal legislative offices use the Net to get information on a daily basis. Ninety percent of lawmakers have e-mail access, and regularly receive mail from constituents (see chart, this page), the survey said.

"We're reaching the point of Internet ubiquity as far as members' being contactable online," says Chris Casey, the technology adviser to the Senate Democrats' Technology and Communication committee and former staff assistant to Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass). "The reality is they know they can't ignore it."

Spam Is Spam
In the beginning, there was e-mail.

The first e-mails seemed tailor-made for firing off that quick, angry letter to a congressman who had just said something offensive on the floor, or who had just introduced a bill raising taxes on Grandma's prescription medicines. Or even better -- why not cc: the letter to all 535 members of Congress at the same time?

And that's just what thousands of early, angry Net users did. As lawmakers gained their first tenuous footholds online, they found their mailboxes saturated with letters, often bitter flames that only occasionally came from residents of their home districts.

"That's an approach that a lot of constituents use, thinking they're going to have a louder voice," Casey says. "There's definitely cases where spamming has made some offices a little gun-shy."

Next: What are your chances of being heard via e-mail?

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