Libertarian club offers new political forum

Hopkins Students for Liberty, a new club for Libertarian politics without ties to national organizations, aims to provide a forum for discussion for students outside of the Democrat-Republican dichotomy.

A common understanding of libertarianism is that its supporters espouse conservative fiscal policies and liberal social policies.

“That’s the way I always describe it to my friends,” sophomore and Club Secretary Dana Ettinger said. “With liberalism, they want very heavy government influence in business, but they don’t want the government to be interfering in their personal lives. And with conservatism, it’s almost the opposite. Libertarianism is sort of both ends of that. They don’t want government interference in how they live their personal lives and they also don’t want government interference in how they run their business.”

The club was founded by Ettinger, sophomore John Kuhn, freshman Jared Mayer and freshman Ava White last semester after they attended a College Republicans meeting together.

“We were talking after one meeting about how we were libertarian [and] how there didn’t seem to be a group that represented that,” Ettinger said. “And then we went through the application process last semester to become a student group and, at the end of the semester, we got approval from SGA.” The club’s founders hope to educate students about libertarianism, including the diversity of views that fall under the libertarian umbrella.

“What we’re trying to do is open [a] forum for everybody,” Mayer said.

Mayer acknowledged that even the club’s founding members share different political views.

“On a number of issues, we don’t see eye-to-eye by any means,” Mayer said. “I think we still all consider ourselves libertarians in some fashion. It’s not like we’re...any kind of political monolith. We’re very much open to varying opinions.”

The organization is designed to serve as a counterbalance to the more established political groups on campus.

“We want to provide another political outlet. We do have College Dems and College Republicans, which is wonderful. But I think it’s great to have a third point of view represented in its own way,” Ettinger said.

Junior Ross Terry, co-president of College Democrats, agrees that it is valuable for another political voice to be heard on campus.

“I think being straightforward about what you believe [and] what sort of ideology you subscribe to is probably healthy for dialogue,” Terry said.

According to Ettinger, Hopkins Student for Liberty will primarily act as a forum for the discussion of libertarian ideas. Unlike the other political groups on campus, it is not an organization designed to be politically active outside of Homewood.

“We’ve sort of purposely kept ourselves unattached from the Libertarian party and various libertarian groups [and] organizations off-campus because we’re really coming at this from a philosophical point of view,” Ettinger said.

With the 2016 presidential election approaching, Ettinger said she has ideas for how Hopkins Students for Liberty will make its voice heard on campus.

“I know College Dems and College Republicans have their annual debate and I’d love to get in on that and provide a third voice…I think that would be really interesting and that could be something fun in the run-up to 2016,” Ettinger said.

Terry does not dismiss the idea, but he does believe it would be difficult to incorporate a third party into the debate.

“It’s already been difficult in the past for the [College Democrats and College Republicans] to find topics for debate that we can agree on [and] that we can both argue,” Terry said. “I’m not saying it’s impossible, but [with a third group] it would be pretty difficult to find topics that we all agree we can debate on and that are actually interesting [enough] for people to show up and listen to [us debate].”

Ettinger said that Hopkins Students for Liberty may also hold its own election-related events.

“We might do some educational events or something about libertarian candidates, who are running, if anyone’s interested,” Ettinger said.

Mayer clarified that the organization will not campaign for any specific candidates.

“I don’t believe we will necessarily advocate for one candidate or another, especially in light of the current political landscape. I think that would just immerse us too deep into the political bureaucracy of becoming an organization that’s tethered to some kind of political platform,” Mayer said.

In order to continue incorporating new members, the club will hold annual elections to choose a new board.

“In our bylines, we have a mechanism for a new board to be elected. We kept it a four-person board…We will have a new board elected and they’ll take over. And that’s how we’ll propel the club forward,” Ettinger said. “Of course, even if we’re not on the board, I think we’ll all still stay involved …We love having a place to talk about all this stuff. Our board meetings, half the time, devolve into just a discussion of what’s going on [regarding] libertarian politics.”

Hopkins Students for Liberty will hold their first meeting on Feb. 23 at 6:30 p.m.

“[At] the first meeting we’re really [presenting] an intro to libertarianism…There are plenty of people who’ve never heard of it,” Ettinger said. “[They] can come [and] find out a little bit more.  Maybe this represents their views. Maybe it doesn’t. But either way, everyone comes with a more robust understanding.”