In Washington, where 11,000 organizations are lobbying Congress, there is an old adage:
Successful lobbies are measured by the legislation they stop, not by the laws they get passed.
By that yardstick, the Alliance for Capital Access was phenomenally successful.
Let’s watch the Alliance in action in 1985, the year it stopped a big one. At the time, pressure was building on Congress to do something about the wave of hostile takeovers, leveraged buyouts and corporate mergers that were sweeping America.
Rep. Timothy E. Wirth (D., Colo.), then chairman of a House subcommittee, was concerned that “shareholders, companies, employees and entire communities have been harmed in these battles for corporate control. ” He wanted hearings to “assess the fairness” of the takeovers.