Democratic Minarchist Caucus

www.Minarchist.org

2006 Nov 08 Wed

In 2005, I proposed an Objectivist Party. In May of 2006, I proposed instead to call it the Minarchist Party.

A day after elections, I am now proposing a Minarchist Caucus within the Democratic Party. It would parallel the Republican Libertarian Caucus and the Democratic Freedom Caucus.

The reason I am advocating forming it within the Democratic Party initially is because the state I live in is a one-party state with the Republicans dominant. In many of races on the ballot yesterday, there was only a Republican candidate running unopposed or a Republican versus a Libertarian.

In 2002 I ran for Congress in a four way race: Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, and Green. The Democratic Party candidate for 2002 was a fairly weak one-issue candidate as no other Democrats wanted to run and lose in this Republican district. Later in 2004 the same Green Party candidate of 2002 ran as a Democrat where no Democrats would bother to do so. By joining the non-incumbent major party, he had secured a platform for his message he would not have otherwise had. I have been thinking about his tactic for two years now.

This Green Party candidate also ran as a Democrat in 2006. Given the mood of the nation yesterday, he did surprisingly well in the polls. I wonder how much better a minarchist Democrat with a message of small government and civil liberties might have fared in this Republican stronghold. In addition to gaining a platform for spreading your message, running as a candidate of the non-incumbent major party puts you in a position for victory when there is a strong anti-incumbent sentiment such as the vote yesterday.

I think the DeLay race also deserves some mention here. I think the lesson to members of the Libertarian Party should be obvious. This is another reason I am now advocating a caucus within a major party instead of working through a new third party.

If you are interested in this proposal for a Democratic Minarchist Caucus, please join me in discussion on our mailing list.

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That government is best which governs least.

~ Thomas Paine, Masthead slogan of the Democratic Review

A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicity.

~ Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address

The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man’s rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence.... The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, and to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law.

~ Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, 1957

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Virtue of Selfishness: A New Concept of Egoism
I must have absorbed Ayn Rand's philosophy of Individualism through reading her fiction novels and the imprint she left on the Libertarian Party. I was unable to put a definitive name on it, though, until I picked up one of her non-fiction books and read the first chapter: "Objectivist Ethics". I now understand the debt I owe her for my philosophical heritage. I highly recommend this book to fans of her fictional works and to libertarians.

The Voice of Reason: Essays in Objectivist Thought
Contains the article "Libertarianism: The Perversion of Liberty" by Peter Schwartz in which he wrote of Libertarianism, "If it were ever successful, it would destroy the remnants of freedom that still exist in this country far faster than of the more explicit enemies of liberty."

Libertarianism: A Primer
I like libertarianism because it is a logical and self-consistent philosophy. Of all the introductory books that I have read on libertarianism, this one gets it right.

1984
I read this book in 1984 while I was in high school and it put quite a scare into me. As I was reading, I realized that I had already witnessed some of the techniques described. My views on government and religion were never the same afterwards.

Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised In Brief
You should read this book if you are at all active in volunteer organizations. It will teach you how to move the business of the majority forward in a democratic fashion without ignoring the voices and the rights of the minority.