We now reach the LNC Executive Committee meeting of June 19, 1996. All committee members (Chair Steve Dasbach, Vice Chair Karen Allard, Secretary John Famularo, Treasurer Hugh Butler, and LNC appointee Sharon Ayres) were present, as were observers Perry Willis, Ron Crickenberger, Stuart Reges, and Gary Johnson. Stuart Reges is identified in the Minutes as a former National Director and Party computer consultant; the Minutes neglected to note the more germane fact that he was a current member of the Browne Campaign staff.
Reges proposed to the LNC that the “P Transaction” should be added to the computer code. Reges said that the Browne campaign would supply information before the convention; Willis announced that a staff worker had time before the convention to enter the data. Famularo disagreed with other Executive Committee members as to whether having the Party handle such information before the convention appeared improper, but agreed to write the needed code. The final motion authorized the National Headquarters to “begin processing the historical contribution information from any Presidential campaign willing to provide such information”. The final vote was AYE—Allard and Butler, NAY—Famularo, and ABSTAIN—Ayres and Dasbach. Under Roberts’ Rules, Dasbach, as chair of a small committee, had had the option to defeat the motion by voting to create a tie. Butler had previously failed to notify the LNC that it was financially supporting Browne’s campaign.
The June 19 Minutes do not explain the detailed functions of a ‘P Transaction’. The July 22, 1996 Minutes provide the details as supplied to the LNC. Between the two meetings, a new National Committee had been elected; the new members of the Executive Committee were Chair Steve Dasbach, Vice Chair Karen Allard, Secretary Gary Johnson, Treasurer Hugh Butler, and LNC Representatives Ron Crickenberger and Bill Hall; all of whom were present. Observers included Mark Tuniewicz, Joseph Dehn III, and Perry Willis. Willis reported that the P Transaction was working, but information from the Browne Campaign had only been entered after the convention. “Perry Willis said that some former members of the Libertarian Party whose dues had lapsed had contributed to the Harry Browne campaign. He said their memberships were being reactivated if they had given at least a certain amount.” According to the Minutes, Joe Dehn said that there should be a public announcement that Browne contributors were “being made members of the Party” based on their contributions to Browne.
The P transaction had several consequences that the Party as a whole might not have approved, if the consequences had been clearly understood.
First, Willis had a secret letter of employment agreement with the National Party, whose terms were only revealed to the LNC on the day in 1997 that he resigned and began collecting his severance pay. In 1996, this agreement was known only to Perry Willis and to National Chair Steve Dasbach, who were both present at the July 22 meeting. Under the agreement as posted by John Famularo, Willis’s pay was determined by the previous twelve months’ revenue and by the current number of members. So long as the Party had had adequate revenue, each increase of one thousand in Party membership was worth $4000 or so per year to Willis as an annual pay increase. The Browne campaign had thousands of donors, or so it said. If a significant fraction of them were reactivated or transformed into members by the P Transaction, Willis would benefit financially.
When the LNC Executive Committee discussed the P Transaction, only Willis and Dasbach knew about Willis’s employment agreement. Neither disclosed to the National Committee that Willis had a personal financial stake in putting Transaction P in place. Even Willis’s enthusiasm for deploying the P Transaction before the National Convention can be explained by reference to his employment agreement. Under his secret agreement with Dasbach, Willis’s salary was adjusted quarterly. If enough memberships could be reactivated in June, Willis’s salary might have gone up three months sooner than would otherwise have been the case.
Second, the National Committee renewed the ‘memberships’ (properly, periods when dues were current) of people who had paid money to Browne but not to the Party. The Browne campaign did not pay for these extensions. The National Party paid the cost of mailing LP News, etc. Some Libertarians will recall periods when the LNC mailed “instant membership offers”, membership cards that were valid if the recipient signed. Browne donors who were not Party members and who then signed the Pledge became Party members. However, National Party By-Laws refer to a member in good standing as one who has paid the established dues. The By-Laws as voted by the National Convention do not permit people to become members in good standing when they had not paid the Party any money, and when no one else had paid for their membership.
Third, while many of these memberships would expire in July 1997, continued Browne fundraising through the end of the year and the multiple incrementation procedure meant that other memberships could persist into December 1997 or later. There is little information as to how many did so. For the 1998 convention, December 31, 1997 was the critical date, because the delegate assignment to the 1998 National Convention was determined in large part by the number of party members in each state the prior November. By converting his donors into Party members, Browne selectively increased the delegate allotments to states in which he had strong support from well-to-do persons. Recall that the Libertarian Party does not have the money to support delegate travel. If you are a delegate, you almost certainly have to pay for the trip. By increasing the delegate allotments from states likely to have pro-Browne people who could afford to go to the National Convention, Browne potentially enhanced the control he and his clique had over the 1998 National Convention.
Debate over the P Transaction continued through the April 1997 LNC meeting.
