We can find out what the thermometer meant by comparing it with Browne’s FEC reports. The thermometer matches the amount of money that had been raised by the Browne campaign, not how much had been saved. Browne’s money went out the door almost as fast as it was raised. For most of the campaign, the meaning of the thermometer remained Browne’s secret. Until May 2000, no reader could learn that the thermometer did not mean what it appeared to be saying, because until May 2000 the Browne Campaign did not file the legally-mandated reports with the Federal Election Commission. Legal obligations of Presidential campaigns to file with the FEC are discussed in Chapter 13.
We’ll see below that none of Browne’s goals for 1998-1989 were accomplished: One Libertarian activist counting Browne fund-raisers concluded that there were more like 50 than 100. Browne’s book did not appear in 1998 or 1999. Indeed, the book was not available in late May 2000, a month before the Libertarian National Convention. Finally, the Browne campaign made almost no progress toward accumulating a cash reserve.
In 1998, all these failures still lay in the future. What did the 1998 campaign do?
Overall, the 1998 campaign raised $270,090 and spent $263,298, increasing the cash reserve from $19,076 at the start of 1998 to $25,868 at the end of 1998. The payroll grew from three to seven. In addition to staff spending, several staffers showed their fine entrepreneurial tendencies: Companies that they owned or formed successfully solicited business from the Browne campaign. Optopia used Campaign Manager Perry Willis’s address as its own; Web Commanders, providers of Internet services, is reportedly owned in part by Jack Dean. Among the staff, reported addresses for Perry Willis and Stephanie Yanik, and for Stuart Reges and Robert DeVoil, were the same.
How much were the campaign staffers paid for 1998? Payments to the staff exceeded $150,000, and consumed 57% of all funds raised by the Browne campaign in 1998. Payments to Perry Willis alone, not counting other persons and organizations housed at his 3092 South Glebe Road, Arlington, Virginia address, came to more than $54,000. Recall that from late 1997 to mid-1999 Willis also received $57,000 from the National Party as severance pay and royalties. That $57,000 is in addition to the 20% of all 1998 funds raised by the Browne campaign that went straight through the bank to the Campaign Manager, his firm, and his relatives. Payments to persons and groups at the Campaign Manager’s home address exceeded $80,000.
Who all got what? As taken from the FEC reports:
WHO AMOUNT PERCENT AND WHY
Perry Willis $54,171 (20.6%, campaign management)
Optopia $9,197 (3.5%, phone travel, insurance, supplies)
Jack Dean $24,649 (9.4%, phone and campaign services)
WebCommanders $6,652 (2.5%, Internet services)
Stephanie Yanik $17,500 (6.6%, administrative services)
Michael Cloud $16,596 (6.3%, travel and fundraising commissions)
Shannon Davis $12,051 (4.6%, data entry and printing)
Stuart Reges $7,901 (3.0% phone, supplies, payroll)
Robert DeVoil $1,402 (0.5%, printing, supplies, data entry)
Total $150,119 (57.0% )
In the Browne Campaign’s FEC filings, payroll, telephone, supplies, and other expenses are often commingled. We can tell how much each of the above people was paid, but don’t know how much of each payment was a reimbursement for orthodox expenses or how much was part of personal income. Commingling is not a routine procedure in political campaigns. Liberty magazine reported making a search but did not find another Presidential campaign in which salaries and reimbursements were comingled in the manner done by the Browne campaign.
Purchases from vendors, directly and indirectly, included:
WHO AMOUNT PERCENT AND WHY
Hotels And Travel $25,586 9.7% of funds raised
Merkle Mailing $21,262 8.1%
Postage/Shipping $19,456 7.4%
Harry Browne $8,610 3.3% phone, travel, and supplies
Vonholtzbrink $7,500 2.8% books
Liam Works $7,209 2.7% books andmailing
Computer Equipment $4,853
Williams $4,550 books
Cardservice Intl $4,213 credit card processing
Mailing List Rent $2,841
Web World $1,435 Internet services
Besides paying its staff, in 1998 the Browne Campaign made substantial payments to vendors. It is not surprising that a campaign based heavily on direct mail fundraising spent nearly $50,000 on direct-mailing type expenses. The direct cost of raising the money based on expenses reported here is in the vicinity of 20% of funds raised. The apparent return on investment in direct mail is around 5:1, which is extremely good for a Libertarian political campaign. Recall that some money was also raised by the candidate in personal encounters, so that actual return on investment in direct mail is probably less than 5:1. Relative to spending for printing and mailing, list rental charges are extremely small, less than 6% of the mailing and postage costs.
Browne had targeted 100 fundraising events. Visits to 28 hotels are evident in 1998. The campaign spent a solid 10% of its income on hotels and travel.
In early 1998, Harry Browne set the objective “Spend very little money.” The 1998 Browne campaign instead spent almost everything it received.
