The Editorial Board, The Baltimore Sun

On Tuesday beginning at 10 a.m., a key Baltimore City Council committee is set to take up legislation creating a system of public financing of political campaigns. Reducing the influence of money on local government ought to be a high priority for every community, but it has special resonance in Charm City in the wake of the “Healthy Holly” scandal that drove the last mayor from office. (Not that the rest of Maryland hasn’t seen its share of pay-to-play schemes at every level as well. Anyone remember Spiro Agnew? Joe Alton? Dale Anderson? Marvin Mandel? Jack Johnson?)

John Sarbanes and Brian Frosh, The Baltimore Sun (Op-Ed)

On July 4, Americans of all political stripes join together to celebrate our nation’s independence from overseas monarchs, from foreign influence, from interference in our democracy.

Ben Ray Luján, NM Political Report (Op-Ed)

At the start of the last Congress, one of the first votes House Republicans took was on a bill designed to unravel protections for workers exposed to chemicals like beryllium. Beryllium is one of the chemicals that poisoned my father’s lungs and caused his cancer.