Nearly 40% of American voters now identify themselves as “independents”. While Rush Limbaugh accuses such folk of having no beliefs whatsoever, a better interpretation of independent voters is that they are, in fact, libertarians by another name. 

The Libertarian Party was founded in 1971, and remains the third largest party in the US today.  In 1980, the libertarians floated their first serious candidate for the presidency, and Ed Clark won over 1 million votes.  When I campaigned for Ed Clark as a college student, I can remember being told by party faithful that, in 20 years, the Libertarian Party would be the dominant political party in America.  And while that political transformation clearly has not come to pass, a more-subtle yet important phenomenon has occurred.  The great independent political middle has become, essentially, Libertarian. 

Independent voters are an unruly lot, but they can be broadly typified as being free market, with an aversion to excessive governmental regulation and taxation.  Independents are not generally on the dole, but rather are working for a living and want to keep what they earn.  They don’t want government telling them what type of car they can drive, what type of health insurance policy they must purchase, or where they can send their children to school.   

However, Independent voters also don’t want the government telling them that homosexuality is verboten.  They are not excited about elected officials trying to legislate morality, or trying to inject religion into government.  Just as Independent voters are not thrilled about government telling them what to do with their money, they also are not thrilled about government telling them what to do with their private lives.   

All of which brings us back to Mr. Limbaugh’s assertion that Independents have no ideological compass.  I would submit that the messy, unruly, amorphous Independent does indeed have a compass, and that it points in the direction of Libertarianism.  Which is to say that Independents, in general, want government to molest them as little as possible, just as Libertarians do.  And, since Independents are now the largest voting block in America, the party which aligns itself with Libertarian values should carry the day. 

This is where the Republican Party has seriously dropped the ball.  Over the past decade, the party that in 1980 under Reagan had focused on minimizing governmental intervention, morphed into the party that is focused on the culture wars and on the moral fiber of the nation.  Republicans, rather than limiting the size and scope of government, instead vastly expanded the role of government.  Rather than shrinking from moral pronouncements in deference to classical individual liberty, Republicans cloaked themselves in religious fundamentalism.  In doing these things, the Republican Party has turned away from the concepts of individual autonomy and freedom, and thereby alienated the Great Libertarian Middle. 

If the Republican Party truly wants to regain power, then it must return to its roots of individual liberty.  It must recognize that the defense of individual liberty, respect for individual freedoms, and limiting the scope of government, are at the core of the Republican mission.  It is no heresy to court the Great Libertarian Middle – indeed, those Libertarian Independents are just waiting for Republicans to remember who they used to be.  If the Republican Party returns to its values of respect for the individual and of limited government, then the Great Libertarian Middle will return the Republicans to the White House. 

Dr. Laura Niklason is a physician and professor of Anesthesia and Biomedical Engineering at Yale University.