Mark Tier, “An Idea Whose Time Has Come,” freeEnterprise, November, 1975, pp. 4-6. Thanks to John Zube’s Libertarian Microfiche Publishing.

When John Singleton told Bob Howard that we had three weeks to come up with a platform for a new political party, one of the first things that we did (the “we” in this case being a small number of libertarians in Sydney who were primarily involved in publishing freeEnterprise) was to phone people in the United States and get them to rush out a copy of the Libertarian Party’s platform.

About a week later, armed with photocopies of this and other documents the Americans had sent us, we had a committee meeting at Bob Howard’s place to discuss what we should do next. There were about sixteen people crammed into Bob’s kitchen, the kitchen being the biggest room in his flat. Various tasks were apportioned to people, and we met the following week and decided we were getting nowhere fast with only a week to go to our deadline. We came to the conclusion (that many of us have come to) that committees are not a way of doing anything. Three of us were assigned the job of writing the platform — myself, Bob Howard and Patrick Brookes. Splitting the job into three parts, it took us the better part of a weekend and a couple of sleepless nights to come up with the finished product. By then we had only a few days left to reach the deadline. We rounded up a friendly typist who typed it out and we were able to present it back to John exactly three weeks after he had asked for it.

The document that is now the Workers’ Party platform is not exactly the same. It took about three months of more committee-type meetings to get it into its final form but it is basically identical. The similarity to the United States Libertarian Party platform begins and ends with the headings of the four parts and some similarities in organisation. Naturally the underlying philosophy is identical in each case. But the Workers’ Party platform is a product of individual achievement; the Libertarian Party platform is a product of a committee in a democratic situation.

While there are, of course, some minor inconsistencies in the WP platform, by and large the reactions of American libertarians is that they would like to throw out theirs and adopt ours, only altering the specific references to Australia.

Before the formation of the Libertarian Party in the US there was already a growing and widespread libertarian movement. The US was of course, itself founded on the Libertarian tradition. One might say it began a Libertarian tradition of its own. Australia has no similar heritage, nor does it have figures such as Lysander Spooner, Benjamin Tucker, Albert J. Nock, Herbert Spencer and others like them scattered through its history. There is one person who is the cause of the current and growing popularity of libertarianism. Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged, published in 1957, led to the establishment of Nathaniel Branden Institute and the proselytisation of objectivism throughout the United States.

Rand provided a philosophical basis for capitalism and libertarianism, but there are many other strands of individualistic thought in the United States, and these were rediscovered as it were, and caused conflict and excitement as the scope of libertarian thought widened. Murray Rothbard, an economist who studied under Ludwig von Mises, represents an alternative approach to libertarianism. Arguing from free market economics, he came to the conclusion that government cannot be justified, either economically or morally, and is the leader of the anarchism section of the movement. Needless to say there are long arguments between the anarchists, the objectivists, the limited-statists, the autarchists, and the other varieties of libertarians who exist. It is probably true to say there are as many brans of libertarianism as there are libertarians.

In the United States the libertarian movement is multi-faceted and multi-directional and highly diverse and diffuse. In Australia, the libertarian movement, such as it is, is focused at one point, on the Workers’ Party. When the Libertarian Party was formed in 1971, it was seen as being a means of getting libertarian ideas greater exposure, rather than as a means of winning political office. The aim of the Workers Party was primarily to win political office, and secondarily as a means to that aim of education. For a libertarian, a visit to the United States is an experience not to be missed. The diversity is incredible and stimulating. The people are fascinating and fantastic and the range of activities mind-boggling.

I was fortunate in having done just that last month. I attended the presidential convention of the Libertarian Party in New York, where there were about 500 libertarians from all over the country, and from Canada, England and Holland — all gathered in one incredible place. Aside from the business of electing the presidential and vice-presidential candidates, national officers, and making constitutional and platform reforms, one could sample a feast of activities and join numerous other organisations such as the Association of Libertarian Feminists, Libertarian Council of Churches (this is a means of not paying income tax rather than worshipping a deity), go to a tax strike seminar, join the libertarians for gay rights, among other things. Those other things included a tour of Manhattan, one of the sights being a view of Ayn Rand’s apartment building.

This diversity was reflected on the floor of the convention itself. Issues coalesced into debates over personalities. There were three candidates for presidential nomination: Roger McBride, a lawyer and writer from Virginia, and a man who as a Republican elector for Virginia in 1972 had cast his electoral college vote for John Hospers, the 1972 presidential LP candidate; Kay Howard, an energetic lady from Ohio; and Guy Riggs, an IBM salesman from upstate New York. There were rumblings from the convention floor about all three candidates.

I am glad I wasn’t in the position to have to choose between them. They all had pluses and minuses from any point of view. McBride was the man who won and won decisively on the first ballot, but most of the rumblings were directed against him as he was seen as being the machine man. Oh yes, the Libertarian Party has a political machine just like other American political parties. But the machine does not have the influence that the Republic and Democrat machines have within their parties. Nevertheless there was some hostility, and the fact that this hostility existed shows one of the defects of the presidential system: that a particular party is represented by one individual. Of course, one individual cannot represent all the members of the party. This is not to say the parliamentary system is any better. It has its defects just as it has its advantages. In fact there is no such thing as the perfect political system. But that’s another story.

These problems came into the open over the election of the vice-presidential candidate. There were three originally. On the first ballot Jim Trotter got 97 votes; Manuel Klausner 95 and Toni Nathan 45. The ballot was deadlocked with no candidate having the majority of votes. Trotter’s appeal was strengthened as a counter-balance to McBride. Unfortunately McBride announced he would veto Trotter if Trotter won, and if his veto was overturned by the convention then he himself would resign. It is difficult to know the precise reasons for this decision. The reason given was the Trotter had not filed his income tax return for three years, not because he was resisting income tax but because he did not have the money to pay. It is a strange situation where a political party committed to the abolition of income tax rejects a candidate on those grounds. There seems little doubt that McBride and Trotter just didn’t get along. At any rate, Trotter, who had changed his mind four times in the space of an hour (thereby casting doubt on his own suitability for the job) agreed to withdraw. On the following day Dave Bergland, another lawyer from California who was flown in overnight, was nominated on the first ballot.

The platform of the party was revised in various areas. Most people were much happier with the alterations, which gave a much more hard-core libertarian stance. However, this reflects the differences between the Workers Party and LP platforms. The LP platform is formulated issue by issue, so that the resulting document differs in style and has minor inconsistencies. The Workers Party platform, written as a whole, is a much more elegant document.

The diversity of the United States is reflected in the libertarian movement. Rather than being one focus there are many areas of potential activity. In Washington, for example, there is a group of libertarians working on the Hill for Senators and Congressmen, and in various government departments. They form a libertarian lunch group which meets regularly. They hope to influence government policies by working through the political process. One of the Congressmen, Steve Simms, is in many ways libertarian. He and another congressman are currently pushing a bill which would abolish the post office monopoly. This is but one of the ways libertarian ideas are being advanced. In Louisiana a man called “Woody” Jenkins, elected to the state house on the Democratic ticket, has done much to stem the increase of government regulation in his state. “It’s surprising,” he said, “that most politicians aren’t evil, they’re just stupid. Whenever they face a problem their automatic reaction is to pass a law. It never occurred to them that maybe the best thing to do was not pass a law.” In Poughkeepsie in upstate New York, two libertarians were running in primaries, one for Conservative nomination as mayor, the other for Republican nomination for city council. In San Francisco a libertarian is running for Mayor and another for supervisor. Libertarians have put up candidates for various officers: Congressman, Senator and President down to dog-catcher. As yet no one has been elected on a Libertarian ticket, but some libertarians have been elected on Republican and Democratic tickets. There are some who now stand a good chance of being elected on those tickets.

This highlights another difference between here and there. It is very difficult for new parties to get on the ballot in the United States. It is not the case of just fronting up to the electoral office and putting down your deposit. One has to get a petition signed by 5% of the electors in order to get on the ballot. In New York, to be placed permanently on the ballot one must get more than 50,000 votes. If that target is not reach then one has to go through the process of petitioning again for each election. The ballot status is very important. It is in fact the first thrust of the presidential campaign. The aim is to get on the ballot in 35 states. This may be a little optimistic.

In California a party called the Peace and Freedom Party, started as a new left political party, has been captured by libertarians. This led to a division between the California libertarians and the party head office which is in San Francisco. Last year the libertarian party ran a candidate for governor as did the Peace and Freedom Party, so there were in fact two libertarians competing against each other. The Peace and Freedom candidate received more votes.

McBride’s proposed veto of Trotter raised some splits within the party itself. The New York state organisation planned to have a convention to decide whether or not New York state would support the ticket. In California a number of people indicated to me that they would just simply not work for the libertarian Party presidential campaign. One such person, however, was fighting a very interesting battle with the Internal Revenue Service. His claim was that he has not received any income since 1968 s0 that therefore he does not owe the government anything. The basis of his case is a section of the constitution which authorises only gold or silver for the payment of debts, and a 1792 law establishing the dollar as specific weight of silver. Thus, he argues, since 1968 when the US treasury stopped redeeming silver certificates, the dollar has no validity as money. Apparently the IRS has had a number of cases on this basis and on some occasions have stopped proceedings rather than have it tested as a constitutional issue. It does, however, seem unlikely that the Supreme Court would uphold the argument, regardless of what the constitution or the laws of the land say.

Many libertarians in the United States are on the staffs of universities. Not only such people as Murray Rothbard. Robert Nozick recently published a book called Anarchy, State and Utopia which received wide attention in the United States; Tibor Machan is a Professor of Philosophy; John Hospers another Professor of Philosophy who was the Libertarian Party’s presidential candidate in 1972; and a variety of people, many of whom are well respected in academic circles as well as being libertarians.

So while the movement in the United States grows it grows excitingly. It grows in a diffuse manner. Its influence on the political system is beginning to show, but marginally and more in specific issues. Such as the question of the Civil Aernonautics Board or the Interstate Commerce Commission; and to whether their powers should be reduced, 0r even whether the two boards should be eliminated. There are many other heartening trends in US politics. For example, the post office is coming under greater and greater threat from private competition. The United Parcel Service, whose vans look like Australian PMG cans except they are painted blue, handles nearly all the parcels in the United States that would go through the post office here. The Independent Postal System delivers most of the third and fourth class mail, at a profit, at rates of about half that of the post office. It even offered to distribute the post office’s first class mail at a price below the post office’s own charge. Needless to say the offer was refused. With rising postal costs more and more magazines are looking at private distribution systems so it won’t be long before the post office in the United States will have shrunk dramatically in size with most of its business removed by competition. It will then be a relatively simple matter (relative to the problems we might face with the abolition of government postal monopoly in Australia) to abolish the monopoly on first class mail.

In Australia, by contrast, the range of possibilities open for libertarian action are much narrower. Also, we do not have the intellectual thrust that exists in the United States for libertarian ideas. Nevertheless, it is my feeling that Australia may well be the first libertarian country in the world. The reason I say this is because of the success of the Workers Party to date. Its membership on a per capita basis is about double the US LP membership. In Australia we are very lucky that Labor has shown us, through dramatic and radical change, the consequences of the expansion of government. Many more people are able to connect cause and effect here than they can in the United States, Britain or Western Europe. There has been a significant reaction against the Labor Party’s policies, although that is somewhat diminished at the moment due to Fraser’s boo-boos. And, the Workers Party has no trouble getting on the ballot. Of course, the preferential system is unique in Australia and enables minor parties to gain support much more readily than in the first past the post system of voting.

The libertarian movement is now well established all over the world, although more firmly established in the English speaking countries. Now only England does not have a libertarian political party. The United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand all have such parties. In Holland, the Libertarians there are talking about the formation of the party. In Denmark we have had the example of Mogens Glistrup and his Progressive Party succeeding dramatically at the polls solely on the basis of abolishing income tax.

At the moment things may seem rather bleak. But in the longer term I think there is little doubt the libertarian movement will grow and grow till its influence tends to tear away the power of government all over the world. In the meantime, something to bear in mind is the possibility of a special trip to the United States next year, some time in July or August, to meet, talk, exchange ideas with libertarians there. To go to the Libertarian Party convention next year, and maybe help out a little bit in the presidential campaign. And get some ideas on how it is done. (More on that in a month or so.)