Yale Law Prof. Heather Gerken draws some interesting and astute parallels between lobbying reform and campaign finance reform over on Rick Hasen's Election Law Blog (part 1 and part 2). She says that in the wake of the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC, “just as beige is the new black, lobbying may be the new campaign finance.” Her two posts are well worth reading.   But one additional thought – aren’t effective lobbying and campaign money related? It’s frequently said on Capitol Hill that money doesn’t buy lawmakers’ votes, but that it does buy access. So if Fair Elections were the law, and lawmakers didn’t need to rely on campaign money from lobbyists and their clients, perhaps they wouldn’t spend so much time meeting with them and might not need to adopt the lobbyists’ talking points (mentioned by Prof. Gerken), quite so readily.