Proposed Missouri LP resolution against the national convention poll tax

As a district representative on the Missouri Libertarian Party's executive committee, I've asked the party's chair to add the following resolution to the agenda for the committee's next meeting:

Whereas, the national bylaws of the Libertarian Party set forth the qualifications of delegates to the party's national convention; and

Whereas, those bylaws do not provide for the assessment or collection of any fee from delegates as a condition of floor access or full participation in business sessions; and

Whereas, the delegate apportionment formula specified in the bylaws is primarily based on the number of sustaining, i.e. dues-paying, national party members in each state;

Be it resolved that:

The Missouri Libertarian Party opposes in principle the assessment of "registration fees" or other charges to delegates for floor access and participation in the business sessions; and

The Missouri Libertarian Party calls upon the Libertarian National Committee to adopt a policy of routine budgeting from sustaining membership dues for the provision of meeting facilities for its national conventions;

The Missouri Libertarian Party calls upon the Libertarian National Committee to require that activities and facilities related to the party's national conventions but not part of the bylaws-mandated business sessions be self-supporting on the basis of payments from willing customers or sponsors rather than on the basis of subsidies extracted from delegates.

Similar resolutions are under consideration by several other state parties. If yours isn't one of them, please feel free to season the above to taste and move it at your next ex comm meeting or state convention.

One reason I'm publicly posting this is to go ahead and dispose of some of the arguments I expect to hear versus the resolution. Another is to help other concerned Libertarians in other states do likewise. I'll do so after the jump -- not all at once, but in successive updates as I get around to it.

St. Louis County Libertarians pass death penalty moratorium resolution

At its monthly meeting last night, the St. Louis County (Missouri) Libertarian Central Committee resolved as follows in support of the Moratorium Now! Campaign:

Resolution for Moratorium on Executions while the Death Penalty is Studied

Whether our group supports capital punishment or not, we recognize that the death penalty system is fallible and that mistakes can happen.

Therefore, we support a moratorium on executions while a study commission examines the death penalty to insure that:

1. Innocent people are not being wrongly convicted and sentenced to death;

2. Race, poverty, gender and victim profiles are not more important to the prosecutor's decision to seek death than the details of the crime;

3. Defendants in Missouri who receive a death sentence are receiving competent legal representation;

4. Death sentences are applied in a fair, consistent and just manner as the execution of a human being is an irreversible punishment;

5. Death sentences are not applied in a racist manner.

Be it resolved that the St. Louis County Libertarian Central Committee calls on the Governor of Misssouri and our Senators and Representatives in the General Assembly to take the necessary steps to impose a moratorium on executions and establish a study commmission to examine the current death penalty system. Based on the findings of the commission we endorse rules, policies and procedures which:

Eliminate the risks that innocent persons may be executed.

Ensure that death penalty cases are administered fairly and impartially in accordance with basic constitutional guarantees, such as the right to due process of law.

Guarantee competent legal representation to every capital defendant.

Focus Group Time!