There are a lot of proposals for reform floating around Washington these days. If we really want to make a difference, though, we need to focus on the three issues that most distort the behavior of our elected officials: money, lobbying, and gerrymandering.

It costs a huge amount of money to run credibly for Congress. This makes it hard for challengers to mount effective campaigns and demands that incumbents spend absurd amounts of their time raising money, rather than focusing on policy-making. Former U.S. Senator Ernest F. Hollings of South Carolina has proposed a constitutional amendment authorizing Congress to regulate or control spending in federal elections. We are in dire straits, and this idea deserves widespread attention.

Even were we to end the campaign financing arms race, though, special interests with money to spend will still find creative ways to cozy up to legislators. So we must resolve right now to make all lobbying as open and transparent as possible. Lobbyists and special interests should be required regularly to detail what they spend on influencing legislation and how they go about it. And all of this information should be available with a few taps on a keyboard to anyone who wants to look it up.

Finally, our election system is becoming obstructed by redistricting efforts that, in the last two election cycles, made it possible for 98 percent of incumbents to be reelected. Districts drawn to favor one party over another make it almost impossible for voters to express their opinion about the direction the country is taking, and allow incumbents to behave very differently than if they have to justify their actions to a skeptical audience. It is time for the states to put redistricting in non-partisan hands.

This is a reform moment in Washington, and we should use it to focus on the most important steps we can take to fix our Republic. Get control of spending on elections, enforce complete disclosure of lobbying activities, and end the partisan gerrymandering of congressional districts, and we will have gone a long way toward that goal.

Lee Hamilton is Director of the Center on Congress at Indiana University. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years.