Document:LP News 1973 January-February Issue 12

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Whatever may happen in the future, the Libertarian Party is now assured at least a passing mention in the history books. For on December 18, 1972, Roger Lea MacBride of Charlottesville, Virginia, a member of the successful slate of Nixon electors from that State, broke ranks and cast his Electoral Vote for Dr. John Hospers and Ms. Tonie Nathan. As a result, the final results of the 1972 Presidential Election became officially recorded as Nixon 520, McGovern 17, and Hospers 1 -- and the LP suddenly achieved instant national recognition, receiving coverage on all three TV networks, in Newsweek, and in newspapers all over the country.

MacBride, a lifelong Republican, announced his decision to switch from Nixon to Hospers by saying that it was "an attempt to put principles ahead of party politics," explain­ing that he could not in good conscience vote for Nixon because "he has moved the government toward ever greater control over the lives of us all, 11 and that by doing what he did, he hoped to tell Nixon that "he has lost his way."

The story of MacBride's historic decision broke in newspapers across the country on the day that the Electors met in their respective State capitols, via a syndicated column by Nicholas Von Hoffman of the Washington Post. In his column, which was pro-MacBride, Von Hoffman discussed the implications of MacBride's action in some depth and needled the GOP for its lack of perception in failing to recognize that Roger MacBride was not just another party hack when they chose him to be a member of their Virginia slate of Electors. (Ironically, MacBride was originally offered the position because he had written a book on the Electoral College.)

Roger's commitment to libertarian ideals goes back much farther than 1972, incidentally; he is the grandson of noted libertarian writer Rose Wilder Lane, and was one of the founders of the Free Enterprise Society at Princeton during his college days in the late 1940's.

His action, although not unprecedented, was of historical significance for several reasons. First, because there have only been nine previous cases in the 150-year history of the Electoral College when an Elector has "jumped ship" (and interestingly, two of them were Nixon electors in 1960 and 1968, making Nixon the only three-time loser in history). Second, because MacBride's move made Tonie Nathan the first and only woman ever to receive an

Electoral Vote. And third, because the Hospers­ And third, because the Hospers­ Nathan ticket is only the seventh minority­ party ticket to receive any Electoral Votes in this century (the Communists and Socialists, in contrast, have never received an Electoral Vote). As soon as the news of Roger MacBride's action went out, calls and letters began to pour into his Charlottesville office, with Dr. Hospers, Ms. Nathan, and National LP

POLITICAL PERSPECTIVE

VIII. FOUR MORE YEARS

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