What Libertarians Believe....
We,
the members of the Libertarian Party, believe that all
individuals
have the right to exercise decisions over their own lives,
and have
the right to live in the manner they choose, so long as they
do not
forcibly interfere with the equal right of others.
The Libertarian Party is committed to America's heritage of freedom.
-
Individual liberty and personal responsibility
-
A free-market economy of abundance and prosperity
-
A foreign policy of non-intervention, peace, and free trade.
Governments throughout history have regularly operated on the opposite principle, that the State has the right to dispose of the lives of individuals and the fruits of their labor. Even within the United States, all political parties other than our own grant to government the right to regulate the lives of individuals and seize the fruits of their labor without their consent.
We, on the
contrary, deny the right of any government to do these things, and hold
that where governments exist, they must not violate the rights of any
individual:
(1) the right to life
-- accordingly we support
the prohibition of the initiation of physical force against others;
(2)
the right to liberty of speech and action
-- accordingly we oppose all
attempts by government to abridge the freedom of speech and press, as well
as government censorship in any form; and
(3) the right to property
-- accordingly we oppose all government interference with private
property, such as confiscation, nationalization, and eminent domain, and
support the prohibition of robbery, trespass, fraud, and
misrepresentation.
Since governments, when instituted, must not violate individual rights, we oppose all interference by government in the areas of voluntary and contractual relations among individuals. People should not be forced to sacrifice their lives and property for the benefit of others. They should be left free by government to deal with one another as free traders; and the resultant economic system, the only one compatible with the protection of individual rights, is the free market.
See Libertarian Party of Oklahoma's Platform: PDF or HTML.
Visit the National Libertarian Party Website for more information.
