Reason magazine makes a strong case for Colorado’s Jared Polis being America’s most libertarian governor:
The 46-year-old governor is presiding over one of the fastest-growing states in the country and a place that has one of the lowest death rates during the pandemic. He pushed back against members of his own party to remove mask mandates, and he consistently argued that public health decisions should be made at as local a level as possible. Last fall, at a conference held by the conservative Steamboat Institute, he declared that the state income tax rate “should be zero” and has supported ballot initiatives that reduced the rate. Polis has embraced occupational licensing reform and was an outspoken defender of bitcoin back in 2014 when Sen. Joe Manchin (D–W.Va.) called on then-head of the Federal Reserve Janet Yellen to ban it. . . .
The openly gay, married father of two recently signed a free-range parenting bill that effectively relegalizes the sort of Colorado childhood he recalls as the son of two ex-hippie parents: “Just because a kid is playing alone outside, it doesn’t mean they’re in danger,” Polis said at the signing ceremony. “It will help decrease false reports so…we can focus on the serious and the real instances of child abuse.”
According to Reason, Polis is also:
1. Pro-choice on abortion.
2. Strongly opposed to government regulation of speech on social media.
3. Opposed to President Biden’s restrictive policies on trade and immigration.
4. Strongly supportive of school choice.
The Reason article doesn’t mention drug laws, but Polis is a strong supporter of pot legalization. (Recall that Colorado was the first state to legalize pot.) Another article mentions that he threatened to veto a rent control measure.
Polis is not a Libertarian, he is a Democrat. But given his mix of policy views he might be the most libertarian governor since Gary Johnson.
It is interesting that Rocky Mountain states (plus Alaska) often seem more libertarian than other states. I wonder why that is?
READER COMMENTS
Chris
May 9 2022 at 7:00pm
There might be a better single statistic to cite, but population density has to be in the running: https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_population_density
robc
May 13 2022 at 2:40pm
The biggest mistake the Free State Project made was choosing NH instead of WY.
Komori
May 9 2022 at 8:30pm
Much of my family lives in Colorado. If Jared Polis is the most libertarian governor, then the libertarian cause in the US is dead.
Scott Sumner
May 9 2022 at 9:08pm
I suspect that both claims are true.
Nicholas Decker
May 9 2022 at 10:11pm
I suspect OP’s family lives in Colorado too.
Scott Sumner
May 10 2022 at 1:01am
Who is OP?
Conor
May 10 2022 at 12:18pm
OP stands for original poster. In this case Komori.
Henri Hein
May 10 2022 at 1:18pm
Nicholas was being cute. By “both claims,” Scott meant “Jared Polis is the most libertarian governor” and “the libertarian cause in the US is dead.”
Komori
May 10 2022 at 9:39pm
OP stands for Original Poster.
Sadly, I suspect you may be correct about both being true.
Scott Sumner
May 10 2022 at 11:51pm
I was always the last one in the room to get a joke. 🙂
robc
May 10 2022 at 9:46am
I live in CO.
Polis is surely the most libertarian D governor (thats a low bar). Most overall? Maybe, as its a re-election year. But last year? Probably not.
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
May 10 2022 at 10:53am
I wonder why he wants to eliminate the state’s presumably progressive income tax? To replace it with a better tax? Which? To run higher state deficits/lowers surpluses? To reduce state spending pare passu?
Garrett
May 10 2022 at 2:17pm
What are his views on the freedom of association of bakers?
Daniel Klein
May 10 2022 at 3:14pm
The Cato Institute fiscal policy report card puts 16 Republican governors ahead of Polis:
https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2021-01/2020-governors-fiscal-report-card-update.pdf
Scott Sumner
May 10 2022 at 11:55pm
That’s on fiscal policy, not libertarianism. Some of those Republicans are far more authoritarian on issues like pot legalization, abortion, trade, immigration, etc.
Roger McKinney
May 10 2022 at 7:44pm
Are libertarians pro abortion? Rothbard described it as upholding natural law, which has always made murder illegal.
Scott Sumner
May 10 2022 at 11:58pm
There is no such thing as natural law. Laws are made by humans.
Monte
May 12 2022 at 2:40am
How sad that the great philosophers and ethicists throughout history who contemplated, researched, and refined the concept of natural law simply wasted their time on “no such thing”.
Kevin
May 12 2022 at 7:56pm
About 3 in 4 Libertarians are pro-choice. It’s one thing to carve out exceptions for women whose lives are in danger, and who also have non-viable fetuses, but, in general, it seems odd to justify ending a life just because someone doesn’t feel like carrying a child to term.
I used to be pro-choice, knowing that it was mostly to indulge women. Why are they so special? Pregnancy can’t be fun, or easy, but unless you are raped, caveat emptor.
In a response above, Scott mentions Republicans being ‘authoritarian’ on abortion. While it’s important to consider all possible circumstances when crafting policy, it seems more authoritarian to me, at this point in my life, to give someone the authority to end the life of something that they are beholden to because of a deliberate choice that they made.
I believe that Rothbard and Ayn Rand also described a fetus as a ‘parasite,’ that had no right to be in a woman’s uterus…as if the predictable consequence of sexual activity is something other than pregnancy. In addition, Rothbard didn’t believe that a parent has the responsibility to care for an infant (or give it up for adoption versus letting it starve). If you engage in sexual congress with another willingly, you ought to have to live with the consequences. I’m not sure why this is so confusing or controversial.
Also, if you are raped, are you granted the ‘right’ to kill? I think debatable, at best. How can one prove that one was raped? Are we to take anyone at their word?
What about the non-aggression principle?
Under closer scrutiny, I would definitely hope that there is room for pro-life libertarians. And taking things even further, and in opposition to the cop-out in the LNC platform, surely, given that the state exists, it has a compelling interest in intervening to prevent murder or wrongful death.
Max More
May 11 2022 at 2:57pm
I’m not making a comparative comment, but I have to say a few good things about our governor here in Arizona, Doug Ducey. He is pushing for “right to try” for medications. He has pushed through acceptance of occupational licensing from other states, rather than requiring people to get licensed again in Arizona; and he’s intent on abolishing the income tax. He wasn’t perfect during COVID but removed mandates sooner than many others.
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