So long, libertarians, and lots of luck in NH

So long, libertarians, and lots of luck in NH

by Al Mascitti • OPINION • 10/05/03

For the second time this year, Delaware lost out to New Hampshire.

First, state Democrats knuckled under to pressure and delayed Delaware's presidential primary a few days, so it follows New Hampshire's by a full week.

Then last week the 5,000 people who have signed up for the Free State Project - a plan to move 20,000 libertarian-leaning activists to one small state - chose New Hampshire as their destination over nine other finalists, including Delaware.

The project isn't officially linked to the Libertarian Party, but shares many of its goals, including ideas for reducing government. Project members intend to use their combined voting power to put their philosophy into action.

It's tempting to dismiss the project as a crackpot scheme for delusional naifs and single-issue wingnuts - a view its Web site (www.freestateproject.org) bolsters as much as dispels. But even the project's most modest aims would require big changes in paternalistic Delaware.

That, apparently, was part of the problem. Though several activists in the two-year-old movement wrote essays citing Delaware's strong points - including low taxes, low dependence on the federal government and a strong pro-business climate - the First State finished a pathetic eighth in the voting, ahead of only the Dakotas.

According to Keith Murphy, a project organizer from Maryland, infringements of personal liberty such as Delaware's indoor smoking ban and gun control efforts by the city of Wilmington gave members pause.

If that's all it took to make them turn elsewhere, it's probably just as well. Some of the pie-in-the-sky aims espoused by supporters will never come to pass, but you don't need to puff your cigarette outdoors to see Delaware lawmakers are antagonistic toward many basic libertarian goals.

For example, libertarians think it's foolish to prosecute crimes with willing "victims," like gambling and prostitution. Delaware, of course, allows gambling only when run by the state or the handful of racetrack owners who qualified by running their initial gambling operations into the ground. Sex businesses are even more tightly regulated - strip clubs, for instance, are subject to onerous laws aimed at making them economically unfeasible.

The "war on drugs" particularly vexes libertarians because it consumes vast resources and infringes on civil liberties. They wouldn't find much support for their views among Delaware lawmakers, whose love of mandatory sentences for drug offenses has helped swell state prisons to the bursting point.

Libertarians who rail against government infringement of property rights would have a field day in New Castle County. Not only did the Unified Development Code summarily change zoning for hundreds of properties, zealous officials now are going after that scourge of society, cars with "for sale" signs in their windows.

In the end, what seems to have most influenced many project members was the warm welcome extended by many New Hampshire lawmakers, including the state's Republican governor, Craig Benson, who told project organizers, "Come on up, we'd love to have you."

If members are naﶥ enough to change their lives over some encouraging words from a politician, they have a lot to learn before they change New Hampshire, let alone the world.

Al Mascitti's opinion column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Reach Al at 324-2866 or amascitti@delawareonline.com.

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