From: Thomas Oliver Martin <tom1@computerlink.com>
Dear Jason,
Jason Auvenshine wrote:
>
> From: "Jason Auvenshine" <auvenj@mailcity.com>
>
> On Sat, 05 Feb 2000 13:32:43 Thomas Oliver Martin wrote:
> >I believe this makes him rightfully eligible for expulsion. If the
> >national LP won't take that responsibility, who will? It's time we
> >exercised integrity.
>
> Given his latest email I doubt his membership status in ALP means anything anyway. But if supporting election laws is grounds for expulsion, how about supporting public schools? The national park system? Public roads? Drug prohibition? I supported all those things at a time when I classified myself as a Libertarian. I don't support any of them now, but I know lots of Libertarians who do. (OK, before anyone says it they're not _all_ from Pima County... :-) If supporting such things had been grounds for expulsion/exclusion from the party, I likely wouldn't have hung around long enough to change my mind.
This is a good point and I think if education is a major tool then
we might do well to provide a good orientation program for prospective
members. The history of this squabble could be used for illustration!
>
> Is there any practical way to welcome people who just haven't
> thought every issue through long enough to be libertarian,
> while excluding people who are willfully aggressive?
We have a trial membership...full membership after orientation and
payment of dues.
>
[...]
> Clarification is fine and good. It's the expulsion/banishing
> stuff that strikes me as unwise.
Think of it as self exclusion by those who cannot or do not wish to follow simple principles. Like you said...Schmerl doesn't want to be an ALP member anyway.
>
> >Failure to exclude counterfeit libertarians in effect excludes
> >principled libertarians. The ALP, Inc. bylaws prove that.
>
> Only when the unprincipled outnumber the principled, and the
> principled do not act rationally.
Your "only" statement is in error. Every counterfeit nullifies a genuine.
> I've said from day one on this discussion that I think the
> rational thing for the party to do is obey the law but oppose
> it by every means possible. That's not a violation of principle.
> If that's what ALP had done in the first place Schmerl would not
> have been able to split the party and there would be no ALP, Inc.
> bylaws.
Given hindsight your were probably right, but ALP leaders were leading in the right direction, unlike Schmerl.
[...]
> When someone is promoting a course that is contrary
> to principle, figure out the underlying reason people might
> support it and take that reason away without violating principle.
I could support that kind of wisdom.
> Exclusion, particularly of someone(s) who have a significant
> number of supporters, is a recipe for disaster.
The more supporters, the more important integrity becomes. For once could we not be corrupted by power? Schmerl is small time! The revolutionaries were disasterously outnumbered. Their principles sustained them.
Be gentle while saying "no more,"
Thomas Oliver Martin