Harvard law professor Larry Lessig explains why we shouldn’t pin our hopes for campaign finance reform on a constitutional amendment, as desirable as useful as such an amendment might be.

Instead, Lessig argues, we should focus on increasing the percentage of campaign donations funded by small-dollar contributors. Attracting small donations could shift the balance of power away from large monied interests, towards ordinary citizens. He points out that it’s much easier to incentivize small contributions than it is to change the constitution to limit large ones.