Officers receive bonuses and paid weekends away based on the amount they raise or help to raise. To keep up the incentive to collect, their tallies are published in reports that come out every month.
The chamber has hired the Swiss Guard of paid consultants from both political parties. Several showed up at a recent dinner hosted by Donohue at the chamber, including Al From, chief executive of the Democratic Leadership Council; Thomas F. "Mack" McLarty, who was White House chief of staff in the Clinton administration; and Scott W. Reed, who was Bob Dole's 1996 presidential campaign manager.
Donohue is careful to say, "We're not an arm of the Republican Party. We need to engage the moderate Democrats." He also doesn't conceal his displeasure that Bush might want to overhaul the federal income tax. With the effective corporate tax rate so low, reshuffling the code could produce "a brawl" among his members, he reasoned, and increase levies on some of them.
Donohue also opposes increased securities regulation -- from the Bush administration or any other source -- and does so with typical ferocity. The chamber is even suing the Securities and Exchange Commission. Donohue has called investigations by New York state Attorney General Eliot L. Spitzer "the most egregious and unacceptable form of intimidation that we have seen in this country in modern time."
"Donohue takes a hard-nosed approach," said Douglas G. Pinkham, president of the Public Affairs Council, a group that teaches executives about official Washington. "Some people don't like his style, but he's not trying to win style points. He's just trying to win."
Sometimes Donohue even clashes with fellow association heads. Former Michigan governor John Engler, the new president of the National Association of Manufacturers, has stepped onto his turf by raising money to help confirm Bush's judicial nominees and to restrain trial lawyers at the state level -- activities that come close to those of the chamber's Institute for Legal Reform.
"I respect Engler's problem," Donohue said about Engler's nascent drive. "He's taken over a membership that's divided. He has to put some points on the board."
The chamber will probably handle most of the anti-trial-lawyer lobbying. A few years ago, a study sponsored by the Business Roundtable recommended that corporate interests fortify their tort reform efforts by consolidating them in one place. The chamber was chosen.
Other groups will quarterback lobbying campaigns that advocate other Bush priorities. The Business Roundtable will head up national advertising to promote private accounts as part of Social Security. The National Association of Manufacturers will spearhead inside-the-Beltway lobbying on the same topic. But Donohue will also be a factor.
"If there's a fight on Social Security, Donohue and the chamber will be in the middle of it," said Steven C. Anderson, president of the National Restaurant Association. The reason: Donohue knows where to find the funding.
Some chief executives keep a sign on their desks that says, a la Harry Truman, "The Buck Stops Here." Donohue's desk holds a sign with a telling variation. It reads: "Show Me The Money."
