Democratic candidates Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) and former Sen. John Edwards (D-NC) collected an impressive quarter of their individual contributions from donors giving $200 or less--although that still means that three-quarters of their individual cash came from big donors. Meanwhile, Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) got just 11 percent of her individual cash from small donors; former Mayor of New York Rudolph Giuliani, eight percent, and Gov. Mitt Romney (R-MA), 10 percent. These percentages are just a tick lower for most of these candidates than what they raised from small donors in the first two quarters, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, when Obama raised 28 percent; Edwards, 23 percent; Clinton nine percent; Giuliani, 12 percent; and Romney, 11 percent. Another thing to keep in mind: these candidates vary widely in how much they have raised overall in the third quarter, with Obama and Clinton far in the lead. So Obama raised $18 million from small donors to Edwards' $7.3 million. And he collected more than $2 for every $1 that Clinton raised from small donors. Meanwhile, candidates who are not considered to be in the front of the pack because of their lackluster fundraising often raise much larger percentages of their cash from small donors. On one end of the political spectrum, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), for example, collected 64 percent of his individual cash from small donors, while Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-CO), on the other, got 70 percent of his individual cash from such donors. This pattern, however, doesn't hold true for all the candidates who are considered to be running behind. For example, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT), the chairman of the powerful Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, got just two percent of his individual contributions from small donors. Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), collected eight percent of his individual cash from small donors. One obvious reason that candidates are forced to rely on big contributors is the ailing presidential public financing program. Small donors' power is enhanced in "Clean Elections" systems in states and cities that have full public financing of elections.