One of the suggestions for "libertarian Democrats" is to describe their ideology in the framework of being "Jeffersonian liberals." Democratic activists may be more willing to listen to your ideas if you present them without the poison pill of the term "libertarian." This is the strategy suggested by Terry Michael, and author Jeff Taylor recently highlighted the role of Jeffersonianism in the Democratic Party in his book "Where Did the Party Go?"

As I've said before, unless a book is either very short or depends heavily on reading it chronologically, I jump around in reading. For someone interested primarily in the Jeffersonian tradition, and not the figures of William Jennings Bryan and Hubert Humphrey, the first three chapters and the last two chapters are key. They outline both the origins of Jeffersonianism and the remnants today. The core tenets of Jeffersonian liberalism as Jeff Taylor sees them are well worth listing (I will at times use my own attempts to summarize):

I can understand how portions of his ideology have been modified by later generations, or the emphasis has shifted elsewhere as times change. An emphasis on legislative preeminence and a limited judiciary may make it difficult to uphold a strict construction of the constitution and the protection of civil liberties. However, it is possible to see how these ideas flow from one another and are related. There is a great deal of faith, for example, that a decentralized democratic society will protect civil liberties, be ethnically inclusive, maintain low taxation and spending, and operate a responsible foreign policy free of militarism and interventionism. I think it gets to the core question of government, if you cannot trust the many to decide the nation's course, how ever are you going to find a few who are worth of such trust?

Jeff Taylor describes the "radical remnant" of the modern times, the heirs of Bryan. I feel that his description overlaps greatly with my own division of "radical" libertarianism between a paleolibertarianism and left-libertarianism. There are groups both on the left and on the right that are not supporters of what passes for "centrism" in today's politics and they match up well with the fundamental tenets of Jeffersonianism. A strict definition of libertarianism would not interest them, but I can see how they could fit within Cato's study of libertarian voters. The core problem, which is something I believe that we will work to address at this blog in our fight for libertarianism within the Democratic Party, is how to unite groups that are traditionally seen as being on opposite sides of the left-right spectrum.

I have since ended up going back over the middle seven chapters and I would say that it makes the most convincing case I've read yet for the "rehabilitation" of the legacy of William Jennings Bryan. As someone who's first academic encounter with populism was Lawrence Goodwyn's "The Populist Moment," I still view Bryan with some suspicion of not being a true radical. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the book's emphasis on Bryan and how he contrats with Humphrey, who I still am not a fan of. With so many books recently attacking the legacies of Presidents from Lincoln to Wilson to Theodore Roosevelt, it's good to see someone pay attention to the challengers and find something admirable in some of them.