The LP of Pennsylvania: Grassroots Efforts to Building an Army
by Juan Angel Rivera

BETHLEHEM- The Pennsylvania Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania held their 2001 Convention March 31st at the Radisson Hotel in Bethlehem, Pa.

That evening, outside the Grand Ballroom two tables displayed Party information including books and t-shirts. The one t-shirt promoted the right to use marijuana. Articles published on Libertarianism in El Hispano were also displayed. Among the many beliefs, the Party supports gun rights, ending foreign aid and the right to open immigration.

According to the future of the Libertarian Party, "Libertarians are in touch with the mood of America. Libertarians believe Americans have the right to live their lives as they wish, without the government interfering--as long as they don't violate the rights of others. Politically, this means Libertarians favor rolling back the size and cost of government and eliminating laws that stifle the economy and control people's personal choices."

El Hispano interviewed Jacob Hornberger, President and Founder of The Future of Freedom Foundation in Fairfax, Virginia. The organization is a non-profit educational foundation that advances the Libertarian philosophy. Hornberger is also an active member of the Libertarian Party, which is a political organization that advances the Libertarian philosophy.

Directly related to the Hispanic community, Hornberger expressed that Hispanics have been taught, especially the Democrats that when the state takes care of people the state is their friend--that's a big con! "What's called the welfare state is the great destroyer of people. It's a destroyer of people and family values. "It gets people on the political narcotic and makes them dependent. Our party is about individual liberty where people are free to keep everything they earn because we oppose the income tax," he said.

"Hispanics engage in voluntary charity amongst families and are the model for that. They're constantly helping one another out or sending money to South America. For example, we stand against immigration control. Our logo is the Statue of Liberty, we believe that people should be free to cross borders, trade, travel and visit and start businesses without respect to what citizenship you are. We oppose the INS with everything we have and the drug war, which is a racist war. Hispanics and blacks face this problem disproportionately. And, so we stand for a philosophy that takes the traditionally oppressed and places them on an equal par with everyone else in society," he said.

What's the worse thing destroying this country El Hispano asked?

In my opinion, the very worst thing that is tearing apart the fabric of society is the drug war. It's not a problem of racial profiling only. Where they say that Hispanics and blacks are always in the drug war. It's the same notion that the state claims the power to control what a person does to himself. We don't stand in favor of drug abuse, but have sympathy for drug addicts. We believe the state shouldn't be in the role of punishing these people by sending them to jail. It's a psychological and a medical problem. But the war itself is destroying people on the bottom of the economic ladder. It's destroying the inner cities and Latin America and also the biggest threat to society and especially to people in the Hispanic community," he said.

Hispanic families want better education for their children. What is your philosophy on education?"We have a totally different vision on education. To share with the Hispanic community, no matter what you do a government program will never work. It cannot function well; it's like the postal service. No matter how good your plans or teachers get, state schooling will never succeed.

We believe in the free market; it produces the best of everything. It produces the best automobiles, computers, churches and religions. We want to take the area of education and turn it completely over to the free market. That means the repeal of all compulsory attendance laws. The end of all government involvement in education, a total free market because we believe that kids are entitled to the best education and the free market produces the best. The state and government produces the worse of everything," he said.

Lois Kaneshiki is from Blair County in the Altoona area and Chairwoman for the Libertarian Party in Pa. She is also an at-large-member on the Libertarian National Committee. Lois said that the Party in Pennsylvania has enormous opportunity to build a strong Party from the grassroots because of the structure of government in Pa. She said that it's hard getting on the ballot because of different state laws. It varies from state to state. "In Pennsylvania we have an opportunity of getting Libertarians elected at the very lowest level of office in the precincts. In every precinct there are 3 officials elected to serve in those precincts. And, we could get Libertarians elected in those precincts and this is a great way to start building a grassroots or an army from which we can build activist and leaders at higher levels in the future. Without that infrastructure and support from the grassroots you cannot sustain any other success," she said.

Her goal is to build that army from the bottom in order to attract the talent that it's going to require to win offices at higher levels. She added that right now it's too small to take over the Pennsylvania legislature. How many members do you have in Pennsylvania? She added that there are about 1,300 members.

But what she finds interesting at the local level is that there's one party that dominates locally and leaves a huge political void. "Voters are desperate for choices. They feel paralyzed and don't know what to do because they're desperate for leadership. We want to demonstrate change for the better. Our ideas are going to bring a better society for everyone. At the local level we have the opportunity to get through. But at higher levels history has just shown that because of the nature of the system you can't break through. It's hard to break through when you have a system that favors incumbents, has existing laws and campaign laws are structured a certain way. Incumbents are reelected between 90 to 95 percent of the time and we cannot break through without that grassroots support. Unfortunately, very few voters vote on ideas. This is the reality of politics," she said.

Kaneshiki added that she is from a rural area and doesn't have direct experience working in the Hispanic community. However, she said that all minorities in this country are majorly screwed. She particularly emphasized that the minority community has to go out and vote in large masses like the senior citizens that go out and vote in large groups to be visible politically. She also expressed that the Libertarian Party has a much better alternative for minorities and they need to understand the nature of the beast that put them in their situation.

However, she heard stories on occasion in regards to dirty politics especially at the local level in Pennsylvania and other parts of the country--it gets very dirty. She also added that Libertarian lives have been threatened; the other political parties see them as a threat.

In addition, there are 33,000 active members nationwide and Montgomery County, Pennsylvania has the most elected Libertarians in America. Acknowledged that evening was Kenneth Sturzenacker of Allentown and several others received awards for their dedication and grassroots efforts. Juanita Ramirez of California received the LFA Writer-of-the-Year Award for contributing news to the Libertarian's website. To know more about the Libertarian philosophy there are three addresses: www.fff.org, www.lppa.org and www.free-market.org.