I have a bone to pick with the Democratic Party. It's a bone I've been gnawing on for more than two years.

I do not think the Democratic Party should be in the business of feeding off its candidates.

When I decided to run for Congress more than two years ago, I decided to run as a Democrat for two reasons. First, working in Tom Andrews' office was an incredible inspiration. And second, having seen a Green congressional race from the inside, I recognized the value of an established political party, with its established structure and organization.

I was very surprised, as a candidate two years ago, to learn how little help was available for the asking. My campaign was expected to pay for the honor of appearing on Democratic fund-raising dinner programs as a member of the host committee. We were expected to pay for ads in Democratic publications. We were even expected to pay for table space if we wanted to set up a display at our own Democratic state convention.

And we could not get the Democratic Party's voter list unless we paid for it. I was told by the party chair that the winner of the primary would get the voter list for free after the election, but those of us in the primary had to buy it.

When I began to organize for the Senate race, I was told by Kevin Mattson, the party's executive director, that the fee for that state-wide voter list would be $5,000.

What I am expected to do, I guess, is to take the $5, and $10, and $25 donations to my new Senate campaign, and make a pile of them on my table, and after that pile gets big enough so that all the dollar bills and the checks total $5,000 – which would be a pretty big pile – I am supposed to take that bundle over here to the Democratic State Committee and hand it over to Kevin, and Kevin will hand me back a disk containing the voter information file.

It feels like I am the quarterback being charged a good part of the gate receipts for a copy of my own team's playing schedule.

That $5,000, if put in the gas tank of my car, would probably get me everywhere I need to go in the next six months on the campaign trail, in my effort to defeat Republican Senator Bill Cohen next fall.

Should I buy the gas or the voter list?

That is a choice I should not have to make.

The list we're talking about is a new list, put together with the help of hundreds of volunteers in Maine Won't Discriminate and the Democratic Party. Pat Peard, chair of Maine Won't Discriminate, told me her understanding was that the list would be made available free of charge to Democratic candidates. Kevin Mattson does not have the same understanding.

The $36,000 cost of merging these lists was paid for by $5,000 from the Democratic National Committee, $5,000 from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, $5,000 from EMILY's List, which actually funneled the money through Maine Won't Discriminate, $15,000 from two or three unions, and the sweat labor of hundreds of volunteers. Six thousand of that $36,000 cost is still outstanding.

The bottom line question for the Democratic Party is: Is it really the responsibility of the candidates to cover the cost of compiling this information?

At a time when established Democrats are leaving the party like lemmings, when several Democrats in our own Legislature whom we helped elect to office are now Republicans, and when the county chair in this very county has walked out on us, I think it is time for a reality check.

It is time for the Maine Democratic Party to stop viewing its candidates as a funding source and start thinking of us as a farm team. It is time the Democratic Party made a conscious decision to support, in every way that is legally, morally and ethically possible, those of us on the front line who are willing to stand up here and proclaim that we are proud to represent the Democratic Party.
I am not in a position to make a motion, but I would like someone who is to move that we change the policy on voter lists, and make them available free of charge to all Democratic candidates, including those in primary races for Congress and U.S. Senate.

And I would also like to hear a second motion returning to Tom Allen the $2,500 he has already paid for his copy of that list.

                        Speech prepared for delivery to the Maine Democratic State Committee but not delivered because there was no room on the agenda of the meeting.