Soccer Dad

Libertarians for mccain?

Earlier, the Volokh conspiracy featured a number of libertarian professors making the cases for different Republican candidates in the primary. The only major Republican candidate who didn't get this treatment was McCain. But have no fear, better late than never, a couple of the conspirators themselves have made libertarian cases for McCain just in time for the general election. (h/t Instapundit) Maybe all those undecided voters are libertarians trying to decided the lesser of evils.

After arguing the benefits of divided government, Ilya Somin writes:

Whatever his other flaws, McCain's election is likely to impede this process, at least to some extent. Moreover, although McCain has some statist tendencies of his own, he does have a pro-market side as well. He is pro-free trade, he was one of only a handful of GOP senators to vote against Bush's 2003 prescription drug plan (the biggest new government program since the 1960s), and he has called for a freeze on most domestic spending and for limits on the growth of entitlements. McCain also deserves a measure of libertarian credit for supporting expanded immigration in the face of opposition by many conservatives.

David Bernstein points to judges first:

Libertarians have been heavily involved in some of the most important constitutional Supreme Court litigation of the last two decades, either in terms of bringing the case, being among the most important advocates of one side's constitutional theory, or both. Among the cases in this category are Lopez, Morrison, Boy Scouts v. Dale, U.S. Term Limits, Grutter, Gratz, Kelo, Raich, Heller, and probably a few more that I'm not thinking of offhand. With the minor exception of Justice Breyers' vote in Gratz, in each of these cases, the ONLY votes the libertarian side received were from Republican appointees, and all of the Democrat appointees, plus the more liberal Republican appointees, ALWAYS voted against the libertarian side. The latter did so even in cases in which their political preferences were either irrelevant (Term Limits), or should have led them to sympathize with the plaintiff (Lopez, Kelo, Raich).

The only exception to this pattern is Lawrence v. Texas, in which Justice Kennedy seems to have been influenced by the Cato Institute's brief. But if the liberals had been able to muster five votes without Kennedy, I'm sure the opinion would have been quite different, less libertarian and more about "tiers of scrutiny" and whatnot. I'm a law professor, teach constitutional law, and the subject is dear to my heart. I'd much rather have the side that tends to take my ideological compatriots' constitutional arguments seriously on the Court. And Raich and Kelo, respectively, suggest that the liberals on the Court not only don't take libertarian arguments seriously, they don't believe in (a) any limits in federal regulatory power, whatsoever; or in (b) property rights, even when big corporations are using the political process to screw over the little guy.

Among his other reasons are free trade and divided government.

The libertarians at Reason mostly disagree! (h/t the Volokh Conspiracy)