Party Games
by Sam Aurelius Milam III
I
was raised in the compulsively conformist Bible Belt, in Texas and Louisiana.
When I came to California in 1971 and discovered a small clique of libertarians,
I was delighted. At last there were people who could understand me.
We started a discussion group and thrashed the issues around thoroughly.
Then one of our members joined the new Libertarian Party and decided to
run for office. After that, our discussion group became a campaign
committee. I walked door-to-door with leaflets. I manned (sorry
ladies, I "personed") the Libertarian booth at the county fair. I
registered voters. None of us expected Libertarian candidates to
get elected. Our objectives were to educate people and to be a source
of ideas for the political mainstream. We openly acknowledged that
as our ideas gained popularity, they'd be appropriated by mainstream parties.
We didn't object. In fact, that was our plan.
It
happens, however, that a campaign committee is influenced by different
incentives than those which influence a discussion group. Different
incentives attract a different membership. They also evoke different
responses from the old membership. What happened to the character
of our discussion group was a microcosm of the more gradual change in the
larger libertarian movement after the Libertarian Party was formed.
Here's how it happened.
Libertarians
became increasingly committed to registering candidates, maintaining ballot
status, increasing paid membership, and protecting the party's growing
vested interest in the elective process. Libertarian discussions
gradually became apologies for compromise as Libertarians joined the struggle
to win mainstream voters. Libertarians learned to woo voters by apologizing
for libertarian principles, rather than by practicing those principles.
By the end of 1987, people who called themselves Libertarians were advocating
some very statist ideas like automatic vehicle identification systems on
the freeways, and franchised public transit systems. Before my very
eyes, the "party of principle" slowly became the "party of principal".
As
the Party gradually acquired its vested interest in the political establishment,
my resistance against the government grew. Eventually, I terminated
my Social Security number, declined voter registration, stopped filing
tax returns, rescinded my driver's license and refused to register my vehicles.
My principles were making my life difficult and even dangerous. At
the same time, I noticed that people in the Party were doing little more
than talk. Every time I saw a cop on the road and tried to be invisible
and sneak away, I got more resentful of the Libertarian Party. Sometime
during 1987, the road cops took my car. Their complaint was that
it wasn't currently registered. After a little pondering, I realized
that it had become necessary for me to give up owning a motor vehicle.
If there had been a large and growing number of Party members who were
refusing to register their vehicles the result might have been different,
but it's easy for the cops to oppress a lone resistor. Since then,
members of the Party have continued to complain about licensing and regulation,
but most of them still have driver's licenses and registered vehicles.
I haven't owned a car since then.
In
July of 1995, during one of my stints as editor of the Santa Clara Libertarian,
I encountered another indication of just how far astray the Libertarian
Party had gone. That month, I published an article in which I exposed
perjury and document falsification within the Santa Clara County District
Attorney's office. The local staff of the Libertarian Party panicked.
They insisted that misbehavior by a District Attorney isn't proper subject
matter for a Libertarian newsletter, and fired me from the position of
editor. The fact is that they were terrified of the DA, and afraid
that he might notice that there is a Libertarian Party in Santa Clara County.
The
Party's vested interest in the status quo has tamed it. A tame Libertarian
Party, staffed by armchair activists, is fine window-dressing for emerging
tyranny. Party members can complain all they want, just so long as
they're docile. Tyranny doesn't require agreement. It requires
obedience.
Today,
the local Party insiders continue to go to their government approved meetings
and "play politics" as if it was a game. They complain at length
about excessive regulation, but they're very careful to avoid doing anything
that might annoy the authorities. Meanwhile, around the world good
people are being slaughtered in various fights for liberty. As America
slides toward a chaos of its own, that change is clearly a response to
growing tyranny. Beyond a certain point, party games no longer provide
any hope of a remedy. Only the extreme politics of incipient revolution
can provide any hope of diverting the government from its present course.
Only a clearly demonstrated willingness to fight a revolution can prevent
one. The party games are almost over now. Liberty isn't a game
any more. Probably, it never was.
| "It is the common fate of
the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The
condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance;
which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his
crime and the punishment of his guilt."
— John Philpot
Curran, 1790
|
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The
amendment doesn't apply to cases arising in the army or in the navy.
However, there's another even more puzzling exception, and that is the
militia. The definition of militia varies according to the source
and its vintage. Clearly, however, the writers of the Fifth Amendment
considered the militia to be distinct from the military forces, since it
was mentioned in addition to them. This is completely consistent
with the definition given several decades ago by the Encyclopedia Britannica.
According to this definition, the militia is distinguished from the draft,
from the military, and from the National Guard. It is, rather, based
on the "obligation of every man to serve his nation". According to
this definition, men (but not women) are excluded from grand jury protection
if they are in the militia, and if the militia is in actual service in
time of war or public danger. This makes it important to understand
the meanings of actual service and public danger.
The
Twilight Koan
