I remember years ago hearing children, myself included, reciting an old rhyme that began “Sticks and stones may break my bones”.
There are numerous variations of the next line, from “But words shall never hurt me” to “But names will never hurt me” and many more.
But the common theme was always that words, unlike physical weapons, cannot hurt you. That of course has always been untrue.
What you are called, or what you call yourself, can cause damage. It can also cause confusion. And the meaing of words can change, even if you try to prevent it.
I have used the words classic liberal a number of times over the past few years to describe a needed political movement that has been somewhat dormant and cast aside by most of the current political parties in our country.
If you search Wikipedia, you will find what they consider the definition of the word. You can also find definitions of libertarian, democrat, republican, and even green in relation to political movements and parties.
According to the Internet acolytes who worship at the alter of the Wiki and feed it content, both libertarianism and classic liberalism are forms of the larger movement commonly called liberalism. They are frequently considered synonymous, but they really aren’t.
Progressive liberals are another form of liberal. In the US, general use of the word liberal has tended over recent years to mean the progressives (or to us classic liberals the BAD liberals), thus slapping the word liberal on something is in some circles akin to drawing a scarlet letter on it. Libertarians have a similar problem as the right and the media try to change the meaning of the word into a radical branch of the Republican Party. The current leadership of their party is helping.
At one point in recent history, the word classic was added to identify one of the older strains of liberalism, one closer to the beliefs of the founders of our nation.
But classic liberal still has the word liberal in it. And people don’t just instantly understand it. It has to be explained as being different from the progressives.
Several organizations, including Project Liberal are trying to reclaim the word liberal. And others are writing about reclaiming the word as well. In the October 25 issue of The Colebrook Chronicle there is a letter (page 5 middle column) from Kevin Craig, in which he gives an excellent account of what has happened to the word liberal and what it really means, ending in his statement that he is reclaiming the word. I strongly recommend reading it.
While it is a difficult task, Mr Craig is correct. The word needs to be reclaimed. Liberal Party USA is one political party trying to do just that. Some of the autonomous state parties that came together to form this organization have the word freedom in their names. Others have liberal, classic liberal or classical liberal in their names. One still has the word libertarian in their name, having disaffiliated from the LP and joined this new party. Personally, I find this confusing, but that’s their choice.
In some states, liberal works. In others, such as my state of South Carolina, liberal isn’t just a scarlet letter, it is a white hot brand on your face and potential loss of job and income in a state that mostly bleeds bright orange/red for their demi-god president elect.
But to names and words. Almost everyone has suggested what they believe are better names for a new party than the word liberal. Are they right? Is liberal a word permanently lost, much as the simple phrase hail victory, spoken in German, has become permanently associated with a murderous dictator who caused the deaths of millions during World War II? I hope not.
So if you are a classic liberal and not afraid of names, don’t be afraid to shout to the world: I am a liberal!
If enough of us do it, maybe we can reclaim the word.
“But words will never hurt me…”
…unless a full bookcase falls on you…
/s
An avalanche of unread books off the night table also works.
Of course, the FEC pile is probably not tall enough by itself to cause harm, but if you add all the notices about the lawsuits against her and or the LNC… It has probably caused the death of at least one small tree by now to make the paper.
There is not a lot of authoritarian control in the LP nationally I do not believe but in essentials there is required compliance, and that is necessary if you are going to have a national organization. Not that there is anything wrong with state-level only parties (there have been some really successful ones), but a national organization of affiliates requires some uniformity. It is confusing when the same name is not used, but you guys do you. I don’t think it is going to turn out like you think. But I wish you well.
I certainly don’t disagree that having some non-uniformity can cause problems. In the states where either the word classic or classical is included in the name, along with the word liberal, I don’t think there is any issue.
Remember, the Democrats still have at least one state where the official state party name includes other words like labor. As I recall the state Hubert Humphrey was from is the Minnesota Democratic Farmers Labor Party. Labor being the modern politically correct word for socialism.
And I’m sure if we looked hard enough, we would find examples within the Republican Party as well.
There has to be uniformity of platform and mission. Otherwise, they are not really the same parties. But if we call a party the South Carolina Liberal Party or Liberal Party of South Carolina, two things will happen. First, there will be extreme confusion with some other party that has the word L in it. I believe you are in that party. Everything from party initials and abbreviations on the ballot, to confusion with voters.
And while we would probably have much more success initially with the minority progressives in this state, they would quickly discover that we are not what they thought we are, as liberal does mean progressive socialist wacko in South Carolina to everybody over the age of five. Remember, my congress critter is named James Clyburn.
And Republican voters and “Independents” would not even look at us. They at least look at the word libertarian before they spit on the ballot and vote Republican. So the name on the ballot is quite important here.
And the authoritarian control that quite clearly exists within the LP at the national level will not be permitted by us. If our state party somehow was overtaken and turned into something else, I would hope that a classic liberal national organization would disaffiliate us. The same is true in reverse.
But as far as a national chair telling us what to do, as your party’s does on a nearly daily basis, no ‘effing way.
Honestly, what does Angela tell you what you to do? I have my issues with Angela, I mean I am in suit against her, but I don’t think that is a valid criticism. This is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. This too shall pass. If I can be so sanguine about it, considering how viciously I have been targeted, I think I can say that.
I’m not in the LP, but from all the reports here, and all the lawsuits, it seems that she is trying to control the state parties in a quite draconian manner.
But we are a week away from the new year, and I am getting ready to start executing the plan. I will hopefully still have time to write, and have a rather extensive series planned for the spring that will be mentioned later, but I will be focusing on guiding the process of creating a new party in South Carolina. Most of the pieces are in place. We can’t legally organize counties until April, but April will be here very soon…
The peace and freedom party already exists in California. Play list themselves as a feminist socialist party.
Several variations of freedom and prosperity or prosperity and freedom exist in the US, mostly as PACs.
Those combinations are not necessarily a good idea to try to use…
And of course, the American freedom party is white supremacist nationalists.
The word freedom has been co-opted, just as bad or possibly worse than the word liberal. So has prosperity.
I’m fairly sure the American Freedom Party is defunct now. They don’t appear to even be a website anymore, and truth be told they were never much more than a website despite a whole lot of talk talk talk. Officially, their position was never strictly white nationalist or white supremacist. Behind the scenes, those descriptions are fairly accurate.
Historically, it’s not uncommon for party names to be recycled by unconnected groups at different times, sometimes by groups that have very different views. There have been left wing and right wing people’s or populist parties at different times, for example.
I don’t believe the words Freedom or American are firmly connected to any past party or ideology in the public mind, as I doubt even 1% of the population ever even heard of the AFP and those of us who remember or studied the American Party of the 1970s are a small dwindling minority as well.
Independent or Independence actually polls better than any other party name, but some states don’t allow it. It’s also been used by very different types of parties over the years.
I hope y’all are having a Merry Christmas regardless of what all you believe.
I wasn’t sold on the name at first, but I have come to love it. It invokes a reaction in both directions and starts a conversation, young people tend to view it positively, and it works like garlic to a vampire on the type of people I don’t particularly want to work with politically. I’m proudly locked and liberal here in Pennsylvania.
Interesting point. I agree that reactions vary, and that hard-core right wingers are less likely to want to try to infiltrate and take over.
I know that a study was done before the name was chosen. I have not seen the results of that study, but I have been told that overall liberal did quite well among people who are not “insiders“ in politics. But since I haven’t seen any data, I don’t really know how many people that was based on or what the demographics were that were asked.
Starting a new political party is very hard. Picking a name, Liberal Party, that will be misunderstood by the great majority of Americans is a self-inflicted burden. I personally would prefer Classical Liberal Party but suggest polling with a list of names to find which name is most likely to be understood by ordinary people as describing a classical liberal party without having to make a long explanation that contradicts the assumptions of average people.
We have been doing “unofficial” polling here in South Carolina. Reactions so far have been mixed.
But most of our polling was before the election. We don’t really have to make a decision on the name for probably another two months, so we will try to get more data and track our responses more carefully once the holidays are over.
Meanwhile, I now own quite a few extra domains that may or may not get used. 🙂
Thanks for the explanation. If my state’s Libertarian Party also falls to alt-right- adjacent edgelords, I expect that I’ll join a classical liberal party under whatever name it has.
I respectfully disagree. As a Classical Liberal myself, the word “liberal” is misunderstood by most in this country. It’s associated with the likes of AOC, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Its original definition has evolved over the course of time and it would take too much energy, time and money for classical liberals to try to reclaim the word “liberal”.
The LP has gone off the rails. And perhaps that was the plan all along.
What we need is a new Classical Liberal party.
The Liberty Party or the Freedom Party.
Everyone likes Liberty and Freedom…although they may define these words differently.
“Prosperity and Freedom” People like prosperity even more.
True.
Although freedom is the driving force behind prosperity.
No prosperity without freedom.
The problem, of course, is that building a party is not simple. Several groups attempted to start a national organization over the last few years, and the only one that is gaining any traction is liberal party USA.
I wasn’t part of the group when they chose their name, or I would have argued for something different, most likely. But liberal is the name that was chosen, and there are now about a dozen affiliates with about a dozen more being formed.
Each of the state parties is an independent and self sustained organization. As such, some of them have the word liberal in the name and some do not. I certainly don’t speak for the national party, but my view is that the national party will serve primarily as the keeper of the common platform, and the device through which the candidates for president and vice president are selected.
I would hope that most of the promotion and work will be at the state and local level, where, for example, parties have names like New Hampshire Classic Liberal party, or Oklahoma Freedom Party.
We are still deciding in South Carolina what the name should be.
But at the national level, I don’t see the organization having any authority to dictate things to the state level like their name or what logo to use. The national committee will have nowhere near the authoritarian control found in organizations like the Libertarian party or the Republican party.
And there will be a lot less lawyers used…
Liberty could obviously be revived as a name, but it has a rather checkered history from the 1840s. Many consider the original liberty party to be one of the for-runners of the modern republican party.
The history is a bit complicated, and includes several mergers along the way.
Or we can put the LP back on the rails again.
I greatly suspect that Ms. Harlos is right: it will be easier, cheaper, and take less effort, to “put the LP back on the rails again,” than to start another 3rd party – of any name – from scratch. LP has 50+ years of existence, ballot status and other legal standing in numerous states, perhaps 100,000+ Americans have claimed membership at one time, and tens of millions have probably pulled the lever at least once for a Libertarian candidate. The brand hasn’t yet been ruined among the vast majority of the public who doesn’t know of, or have interest in, the factionalism of the last few years. The only question is “Does a third party in America get a large enough soapbox to make having a third party worth the effort?” Mr. Nolan and friends thought so 53 years ago.
What does experience tell us?
The LP lost the status of being a classical liberal party quite a number of years ago. It contains far too many lunatics to be salvageable.
If there is one thing that I learned in the 15 years I was active in the LP, it is that the LP is not a party. It is a club, where everyone competes for attention and internal power. The very nature of how it is structured puts states against each other in competition for power.
But power over what?
A party that debates over whether they should be running candidates or not is not a party. It is a lunatic asylum, and the lunatics are in charge and have been for decades.
Sorry to be blunt about it, but rational people need to move on, and many of us already have.
Sorry to be blunt, this crash and burn will be epic and most will end up back in the LP if we can take out the trash. If we can’t take out the trash it will because of losing valuable hands to this doomed project.
If Vest or Harlos win their suits it will be a huge sea change.
The LP was never a CL party, it is a libertarian one. The two have a lot of overlap but are not the same thing. Both need to be welcome in one, and that’s the LP. You exclude anarchists and you are on wrong foot imho but not my business I guess.
ATBAFT is correct, and asks the right question..my answer after 53 years is a no, and is bolstered by my experience in other minor parties (American/American Independent, Constitution, and Reform in addition to Libertarians) over a few more years than that, ever since I was table height and in short pants.
https://thirdpartywatch.com/2024/10/21/opinion-the-era-of-parties-is-over/
The article is somewhat skeletal, and I may work on a longer version with data, references, and additional explanation of why some things in it are relevant to my point.
The title somewhat overstates the case, since the process will take probably several more decades to complete and at least for the time being ad hoc minor parties are useful for ballot access in some states vis a vis nonpartisan candidacy.
As for the name, liberal isn’t going to do y’all any favors in my neck of the woods, and will probably just lead to a bunch of progressives to be disappointed up north, but experience is the best teacher so you’ll see for yourselves.