Funding Liberty! Table of Contents
Funding Liberty!
Chapter 20
Election Day. Browne Loses.
Now the show reaches the end of the road. On November 7, 2000, the American people, or at least some of them, cast their votes. In a very few states, the vote total was very close. The final popular vote outcome was
Al Gore 51,003,238
George Bush 50,459,624
Ralph Nader 2,882,985
Pat Buchanan 449,120
Harry Browne 384,440 0.36%
Other 232,922
It would be a month before George Bush or Al Gore found out which of them had won the election.
What was certain was that Harry Browne lost, even before thousands of Browne votes were apparently stolen by Florida Democrats. Browne got substantially fewer votes in 2000 than he did in 1996. In a few states, such as Georgia, there were great advances. In other states, notably Pennsylvania, there were massive losses. It should not surprise readers that as soon as the results were known Libertarian spin merchants began deploying explanations for Browne's catastrophic failure. Many of the explanations were excuses for Browne that do not hold up to close examination.
Excuse #1: 2000 was a bad year for third parties in general.
The total vote for Third Party candidates went down from 1996 to 2000. However, most people vote for a specific third party for a specific reason, not for the generic third party candidate regardless of label. To say that third parties as a group did badly, one must show that at least most third parties did worse in 2000 than in 1996. It may be true that the largest third party did worse in 2000 than in 1996, but that’s a specific change, not a generic outcome. Furthermore, third parties change their labels. Most voters who support third parties are up to following these changes. This, the Party of Perot did worse in 1996 than in 1992, but Perot’s party label changed between the two elections. In tracking how Perot did, we follow the substance of the organization, not the party’s current label.
Look at the numbers. To compare 1996 and 2000, you have to make rational comparisons. People vote for third parties for what they are, not what they are called at the moment. Thus, Ross Perot ran in 1992 and 1996, once as a self-nominated independent and once as the Reform party candidate. Comparing Perot's 1992 and 1996 vote totals is appropriate, because Ross was Ross, even though the logo was a trifle different. Perot did much worse in 1996 than he did in 1992. The “Reform Party” did better in 1996 than in 2000. The latter comparison is meaningless, because in 1996 people voted for Perot, not for the Reform Party label. Perot did not run in 2000. The disappearance of Perot from the electoral map dropped the total third party vote but refers only to how the “Party of Perot” did.
So what are the comparisons? The Green Party ran Ralph Nader in 1996 and 2000. The Green Party vote total went from 0.5% (barely beating Harry Browne in 1996) to several percent in 2000. The United States has a small collection of parties of the Christian right. In 1996, they gathered as the Constitution Party. The Party was created as the perfect vehicle for Pat Buchanan, if he chose to bolt from the Republicans. Buchanan remained a loyal Republican. The Constitution Party ran Howard Philips, and in 1996 got almost 0.2% of the vote. In 2000, the Constitution Party ran Howard Philips again. The parties of the Christian right also gained a second vehicle, because in 2000 Christian rightist Buchanan did bolt from the Republicans and ran as a third party candidate under the banner "Reform Party". Was this the same as Perot's Reform party? One was the legal inheritor of the other to the tune of millions of dollars, but the 1996 and 2000 Reform Parties appealed to unrelated audiences. The parties of the Christian Right between them got close to 0.6% of the vote, roughly three times their 1996 total. Indeed, Buchanan beat Browne.
Only Harry Browne and Natural Law Party candidate John Hagelin did worse in 2000 than in 1996. According to press reports, the Natural Law Party was formally dissolved after its 2000 defeats. Some Third Parties did better in 1996 than in 2000, and some did not. The biggest did not, but there is certainly no trend here.
Excuse #2 "The election was close. Our 1996 voters instead voted for the Democrat or Republican."
The election was close in a few states. In many other states the election was anything but close. Gore carried Massachusetts by 24 points; Bush carried Utah and other states by 40 points. Most people in most states have a reasonable sense of who is ahead in their state. When one candidate is ahead by 24 or 40 points, voters know that the outcome in their state is certain. They may vote for whomever they want without fear of the wasted voter superstition, the erroneous meme 'you're wasting your vote.'
Of course, there are a lot of voters who are unaware that there is an Electoral College, let alone how it works. Most of these voters think that the national vote totals, the 50 million votes cast for one candidate or the other, determine who won the election. These voters can't imagine why the state by state vote totals matter, or why voting for Gore in Massachusetts was seriously unlikely to affect the election's outcome. For the current Libertarian Party, these people won't matter for a few election cycles yet. Before people can choose to Vote Libertarian!, they need to hear of us and to decide to vote for us. To become a possible Libertarian voter, people need to have at least a little political sophistication, enough that they surely know how the Electoral College works.
Did the closeness of the election matter? It's easy to test if voter concerns that "the election is close" depressed Libertarian vote totals. Draw a graph, taking as the horizontal axis the difference between the Bush and Gore vote percentages. States that Bush or Gore carried by a lot will be at opposite edges of the graph. States that were near-draws will be in the middle. If "the election was close" hurt Browne, Browne will have done the worst with the states in the middle of the graph where the election was close, and the best with the states at the left and right margins, where the election was not close at all.
What is 'better' or 'worse'? We are comparing 1996 and 2000. The appropriate comparison is with Browne's 1996 vote totals. If the Browne vote increased from 1996 to 2000, Browne did well. If Browne's vote percentage fell from 1996 to 2000, Browne did poorly. Plot the change in the Browne vote against the percent difference in the Bush and Gore votes. If the closeness of the election matters, the plot will look like a bowl, lowest in middle. Browne will do least well in states where Libertarian swing voters might affect the outcome.
I did that graph. There are a few states that are way off by themselves, such as Georgia. You should take note of them, but they're not following the general rule. I computer generated the average curve, which in a certain mathematical sense is the best possible description of the data as a smooth line. (It's a quadratic, for those of you who remember high school algebra.) The curve is very close to a straight line. Harry did no worse in states where the election was close than he did in states where Gore or Bush ran away. "The election is close" phenomenon did not depress Libertarian vote totals.
There is one peculiarity in the graph. The fitted curve is straight. It also has a substantial tilt. Browne selectively did better where George Bush did well, and selectively did worse where George Bush did poorly. Why?
As one explanation, perhaps this was an echo of Project Archimedes. Remember Archimedes? It was a direct mail campaign. Several million copies of its letters went out. They may not have persuaded people to join, but some fair fraction of them did persuade recipients to read about the Libertarian Party. For all that we say that we are equidistant from left and right, the letters went selectively to right-wing mailing lists, and pushed issues likely to appeal to people on such lists. And the letters? They just happened to feature the words and face of Harry Browne. All that paper, millions and millions of pages, went selectively to places with right-wing households, places where Bush would do well. The Project Archimedes letters boosted Browne's vote with conservatives to whom the Party did recruitment mailings.
As an alternative explanation, it may be the case that Libertarians on the average are more supportive of liberal candidates than they are of conservative candidates. This explanation is consistent with exit polling data. In the case of which I am aware, the Libertarian Party candidate was selectively supported by voters who would elsewise have supported a liberal Democrat over a conservative Republican by a 3:2 margin.
Myths in Ruins
The election outcome did, however, crush several myths about Libertarian Presidential strategy:
Myth #1. If we run a celebrity we'll get substantial vote totals, five or ten percent of the vote, and become a major player.
In 2000, the Green Party did this. They ran Ralph Nader, who is about as well known as you can get for a politically serious celebrity not already tied to one party or the other. They ran a well-supported campaign with big rallies. They got less than 3% of the vote.
Myth #2. Elections are won at so many dollars per vote. If we were to really sacrifice, raise lots of new members who would all contribute, and put together a $20 million campaign instead of a $2 million campaign, we would get five or ten percent of the vote and be a major player.
In 2000, the parties of the Christian Right did this. Pat Buchanan qualified for $12 million in Federal campaign spending, and spent a similar amount of his own first. The Christian Right vote total did go up—from 0.2% to 0.6%. A vast increase in money out the door netted a very small number of additional votes. On the other hand, Howard Philips spent a tiny amount of money, around a twentieth of what Browne spent, and received a quarter of Browne's vote totals.
Myth #3. Vast media spending will break us through from 0.5% to 5.0% of the vote.
In 2000, the parties of the Christian Right tried this. Buchanan's FEC reports show spending in million dollar chunks going to advertising placement firms. Friends who listen to family-oriented radio stations report being swamped in radio ads for Buchanan. Buchanan made his vast media expenditures and received his one half of one percent, barely enough to beat Browne.
Myth #4. Libertarians on the average have some preference for the Republican Party over the Democratic Party.
In fact, to the extent that they had a preference, more Libertarians were apparently willing to sacrifice their Libertarian vote to rescue a Democrat than they were to sacrifice their Libertarian vote to rescue a Republican. I compared the change in the Harry Browne vote between 1996 and 2000 with Bush and Gore's performances in 2000. Browne lost votes in states that went for Al Gore. In the states that went most heavily for George Bush, Browne tended to break even. Ignoring outliers, Browne did no worse in states that were very close than in states in which Bush or Gore ran away in the vote. The outliers, the few states where Browne improved dramatically, were states where Bush and Gore ran a close race. To the extent that either Bush or Gore captured Libertarian votes, the votes seemingly went to Gore, suggesting—as an alternative to the Project Archimedes interpretation—that more Libertarians thought it was important that Gore won than thought it was important that Bush won. [The perspective that a Libertarian could prefer Gore to Bush if they were the only two choices appears to be very difficult for right-leaning Libertarians to grasp.]
Myth #5. 50 State Ballot Access Signifies to the Press.
Nader was not on the ballot in 50 states. He had extensive press coverage. Browne was on the ballot in all 50 states in 1996. A Libertarian was on the ballot in every state in 2000. Browne had negligible press coverage.
Myth #6. In Pennsylvania, only a few activists were unhappy with Harry Browne.
In November, 2000 there were 30,248 registered Libertarian voters in Pennsylvania. Of course, all of them did not make it to the polls on time. Nonetheless, the Party's U.S. Senate candidate received 45,775 votes, half again as many votes as there were Libertarian registrants. In the same election, Pennsylvania's voters gave Harry Browne a grand total of 11,248 votes. That is, three out of four voters who were willing to support John Featherman for U.S. Senate were unwilling to cast a vote for his Presidential running mate. At least two out of three voters who registered Libertarian—and probably more, since Libertarian voter turnout is certainly not 100%—declined to vote for their Party's Presidential candidate. This is a level of rejection almost without precedent in American history. Only a tiny minority, given voter turnout percentages perhaps as few as one in six, of all registered Libertarians could be prevailed upon to support Harry Browne. Nonetheless, the Party faction that gave us Browne 1996 and Browne 2000 was hard at work preparing to give us 'the same or more for 2004'. It is then no surprise that by late 2001 at least some Pennsylvania activists not in the Party leadership were openly calling upon the Party to sever its ties with the Libertarian Party of the United States.
In December 2000, Browne had been defeated again. His campaign had raised millions of dollars, some of which was even spent during the general election season on public outreach. All his promises and strategems were, in the end, for naught. He ended the election well behind where he had placed in 1996. Behind the scenes, his inner circle supporters remained active in the Libertarian Party. They knew in advance they needed a new Presidential candidate for 2004, and were already busy grooming one.