Ernest Hancock
for Chairman of the
United States
Libertarian Party

ErnestHancock.org

Ernest Hancock
Phoenix, Arizona
602-717-5900
ErnestHancock@cox.net

Statement by Ernest Hancock

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The 2004 Atlanta Convention was my initial introduction to Libertarians in Convention. I was motivated by my opposition to the LPUS not taking a clear stance against war in general and certainly an undeclared unconstitutional one. My effort was accompanied by the following newspaper I published http://westernlibertarian.org/paper/WLA%20Complete%2032pg%20low%20res.pdf.

The 2006 Portland Convention was an effort to clearly define my goals and philosophy, what methods I have used in my efforts to free minds, what I thought the Libertarian Party should be doing http://www.strike-the-root.com/61/hancock/hancock1.html and why.

The 2008 Denver Convention will be an historical marker. I have devoted most of my adult life to the promotion and attainment of freedom for myself and my family because I know what the alternative is. The LPUS can be a powerful tool in support of individual liberty, but it lies dormant waiting for the passion and confidence to ignite a hunger for the truth. This has already begun and I want to keep the revolution a peaceful libertarian one.

Six months after the 2006 LPUS Convention Ron Paul would embrace the libertarian philosophy that had been abandoned by the 2006 LPUS convention. I immediately knew what needed to be done and the Ron Paul Revolution was created here in Phoenix, Arizona by me and a few friends. The r3VOLution was always a libertarian project to free as many minds as possible (some examples http://www.youtube.com/user/ernesthancock ). While my efforts behind the scenes are certainly no secret (I am publisher of http://www.FreedomsPhoenix.com), many of you may not know just how important libertarian activists were to the awakening of hundreds of thousands of individual minds to the libertarian philosophy,… and we have just gotten started.

We are closer than we have ever been in our lifetimes to the time when being libertarian will be a minimum requirement for political support from the majority of Americans.

Now is not the time to be less libertarian … Now is the time to be clearly libertarian.

“Freedom’s the Answer, … What’s the Question?”

The Libertarian Party was once well known as the head of the spear on the very issues that now dominate the national press, yet we are not included in the national debate. Not only do I intend to use this campaign for the Chairmanship to demonstrate a desire and ability to place libertarian philosophy as a solution to the problems facing America into the minds of the people in America and the rest of the world, but to ask why it hasn’t been done already.

If you don’t know me personally, please ask someone who does and ask them if I have any doubt of what will be accomplished.

Want to know how?  I guess you’ll just have to keep paying attention.

These words, taken from the conclusion of my message of 2006, need to be emphasized so that you understand my confidence in the libertarian message and why I was so certain of what could be accomplished in the promotion of the libertarian message via the Ron Paul Revolution. In years past I have always found opportunities to free as many minds as possible.

From the Blog Page of February 16^th 2008:

The Ron Paul r3VOLution has been the largest confirmation of libertarian principles and decentralized effort on a national scale than any other that I know about. The r3VOLution is libertarian at its core (started by libertarians, supported by libertarians, promoting libertarian principles) and all the while the LPUS and its candidates have been floundering back and forth in a debate about the endorsement/support/drafting of a Republican (the Ron Paul part) and ignoring the whole meaning behind the r3VOLution. The Libertarian Party should have been the first to embrace this libertarian movement like many of the best libertarian activists from all over the country did. The r3VOLution isn't represented by any one candidate. And we are going to find out how many candidates will make use of "LOVE" in this revolution to represent their campaign efforts.

For the LPUS to ignore such a large political movement based on libertarianism and allow a Republican candidate for President sole dominion over a movement so libertarian is very shortsighted and dumbfounding to many.

While the LPUS has been,… doing whatever it has been doing, thousands of libertarian activists across the country, and the world, have been very busy creating this opportunity. I seek the Chairmanship of the Libertarian National Party to make certain that the opportunity to rescue millions of minds is not squandered.

Ernest Hancock seeks the Chairmanship
of the United States Libertarian Party
(From his 2006 campaign statement)

… and here’s why:

My exposure to libertarian philosophy in 1991 lifted a great burden from me. Like many others I was very pleased to learn that principles of truth and justice had been able to make its way into the political arena where they were greatly needed. My wife and I had just had our fourth child when the reality of the true nature of our government was revealed to us in 1989. Starting a business, playing by the rules and living a clean life only made you easy cream to be skimmed from the top by an ever encroaching government.

Increased association with others seeking answers only put us close enough to the front lines in the freedom movement to see the results of government bombardments. This story of a young family becoming aware of what would be waiting for their children as they came of age is repeated thousands, even millions, of times across America. Like so many others we sought the truth and a way to invest a portion of our time and money in doing what we could to ensure a better life for ourselves and our family.

Details of my activism that brought our family into contact with libertarians can be discussed later. This open letter of Introduction/Announcement is for expressing my personal motivation for seeking the Chairmanship of the United States Libertarian Party. And after providing a general, but very clearly reasoned, outline of what I would do in such a position, I hope to gain your endorsement and financial support so that I can spread this message to as many as possible, inside and outside the libertarian movement.

Over the years, I have been a witness, and often a party to many “discussions” that have occupied libertarians for as long as I have been involved. I have no hesitation making my positions clear on each of them, but find the reasoning process far more informative in an effort to seek your support, whether you share my conclusion or not.

The first example of dissenting opinions among Libertarians in Convention that surprised me was the issue of ‘The Pledge’. Please allow me to explain…

My political activism prior to meeting libertarians was devoted to the injustices of the Arizona Election Laws because I felt at the time that all of government’s power to harm was due to their elimination of any worthy competition before it could ever be a threat. As our investment in the future, my wife Donna and I made the calm decision to challenge all of the Election Laws that we felt violated the US Constitution. Over 44 Arizona election laws were challenged all the way to the 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals. A great deal was learned and many friends were made in the process. Other law suits would follow and the battle which would last a lifetime was engaged. During the first three-year period of education and action I would come to know that libertarians were the only ones who truly understood what I was doing and why. I was lucky to have met these very principled libertarian freedom fighters. The more I learned about libertarian philosophy the more I came to understand how moral their philosophy was.

While I felt no need to join the National Party, I was clearly libertarian to all who knew the difference and was welcomed into the Libertarian Party in Arizona. I immediately understood the purpose of “The Pledge” and eventually joined the LPUS before attending the 1996 Convention in Washington, D.C.  While I have no personal investment either way in the Pledge argument, I do see an advantage to having a “Statists are not Welcome” sign at the front door of the Libertarian Party. In fact it was at the 1996 Libertarian Party convention that the Pledge became very useful. Less than a week before the convention, the “Viper Militia” story broke in Arizona when the Janet Reno and the Clinton administration arrested over a dozen people claiming all sorts of illegal activity that would send many to jail. Even though the media would later admit they were lied to and that the arrests were a propaganda stunt more than anything else, the focus was on the two arrested registered Libertarians until officers at the Washington convention were able to make clear in every media interview how national party membership required a pledge to the non-initiation of force...“oh, well then, never mind”. It was made clear at the convention in 1996 that it was this very reason in the early ‘70’s which prompted the creation of the pledge. But this experience has little to do with my concerns about the effort to eliminate the Pledge.

The most vocal argument over the years is that the pledge is responsible for the loss of potential membership from those who find it too restricting, open to interpretation, anarchist, etc. I am much more concerned about the LP becoming hypocritical in their support of the libertarian principles behind the intent of the pledge than I am the retention of the Pledge. So while I support the retention of the Pledge, you’ll find me instead spending my time and effort on support of what the Pledge was suppose to accomplish, a welcome haven and resource nexus for those supportive of promoting no-compromise libertarian principles.

This brings us to the purpose of the LPUS. “We, the members of the Libertarian Party, challenge the cult of the omnipotent state and defend the rights of the individual.” It was this first sentence of the “Statement of Principles” that was the most inviting to an activist who had lost any tolerance for subtlety in his effort to make his position clear. (On a side note: I have noticed that many in opposition to the Pledge are also in opposition to this portion of the Statement of Principles.)

The volume of the cry to remove anything that might be considered offensive to members of other parties are often accompanied with statements about how ‘the Libertarian Party is after all a political party, and political parties are in existence to elect individuals to public office so that public policy can be altered.’

I could spend a great deal of time in this introduction on missed opportunities, advocate a focus on the strengths of libertarian philosophy, and wonder aloud about "Where in the hell is the Libertarian Party in their 'challenge of the omnipotent state and defense of the individual' when everything we have been warning the world about is currently happening all around us," but right now I want to stress how concerned I am about the trend these three issues represent.  The sustained campaign to oppose statements that clearly set libertarians apart from the philosophies which support the “omnipotent state” must be clearly challenged. The idea that votes are more important than freeing the minds of the people who would freely support us when we demonstrate that we seek freedom above recognition is counterproductive to all we hope to accomplish.

I hope you now understand my motivation for seeking the Chairmanship of the National Libertarian Party. As the campaign develops I am excited about sharing my ideas. But our party structure (when followed) does not allow for unilateral control, even from the National Committee. I can be counted on to follow the contract the Party has with its Members (its Platform and By-laws) and not deviate for a moment from libertarian principles. It is my hope that support for this campaign is a clear demonstration for the desire to lead in the national political debate with the most powerful and moral philosophy yet developed for human interaction.

We are closer than we have ever been in our lifetimes to the time when being libertarian will be a minimum requirement for political support from the majority of Americans.

Now is not the time to be less libertarian … Now is the time to be clearly libertarian.

“Freedom’s the Answer, … What’s the Question?”

The Libertarian Party was once well known as the head of the spear on the very issues that now dominate the national press, yet we are not included in the national debate. Not only do I intend to use this campaign for the Chairmanship to demonstrate a desire and ability to place libertarian philosophy as a solution to the problems facing America into the minds of the people in America and the rest of the world, but to ask why it hasn’t been done already.

If you don’t know me personally, please ask someone who does and ask them if I have any doubt of what will be accomplished.

Want to know how?  I guess you’ll just have to keep paying attention.

Please email me with all of your questions and I will answer them all here in the open on this web site.

Ernest Hancock
ernesthancock@cox.net

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