organizationspotlight: Mercer Libertarians

The Mercer Libertarians is a student-run organization focused on trying to raise political awareness and increase political participation amongst Mercer’s student body.
McCabe Olsen, Ethan Trice and Aaron Walden started the group during their sophomore year to offer an alternative to Mercer’s Republican and Democrat groups. Each person currently has a hand in running the group with Olsen as the Secretary Treasurer, Trice as the Vice President and Walden as the President of the group.
Mercer Libertarian’s focus is about promoting better awareness of the country’s current political situation amongst Mercer’s student body. “More college students need to be politically aware,” said Trice. The group also feels that not enough college-age people care about politics.
Some of Mercer Libertarian’s past activities include overseeing voter registration last semester, and trying to get people involved in the primaries. They have also worked with other groups such as Omicron Delta Kappa (ODK), even if there was not too much overlap between the two groups’ activities.
The group is currently planning activities for this coming year. Mercer Libertarians is trying to connect with other on-campus groups at Mercer. Trice, Walden and Olsen are active in other student groups and said they hope to use those connections to increase Mercer Libertarian’s involvement in campus events.
Last semester, the Mercer Libertarians had a subset of their group called the Youth for Ron Paul that they worked with. Members of this subset focused their activities on the upcoming Presidential Election and tried to set up a petition to have Ron Paul come speak on campus.
There are currently about 30 members of Mercer Libertarians. According to Walden, they have 10 main members that attend meetings on a regular basis, with others participating when they are available.
When they meet, members of Mercer Libertarians discuss political events and upcoming elections on both a national and local level. They also discuss their own personal political beliefs and solutions to issues in contemporary politics.
The Mercer Libertarians consider themselves supporters of the Libertarian Party. The Libertarian Party is the third largest political party in the United States.
Created in 1971, the Libertarian Party’s founders believed that America’s politicians had strayed too far from America’s principles of individual liberty, and personal responsibility. They also believed that the Democratic and Republican parties had created the status quo and as a result do not wish to change it.
Some main principles of the Libertarian party are: belief in small government, cutting taxes and that people should be able to choose what they eat, drink or smoke without government intrusion. The Libertarian party also believes that the U.S. Government should defend its citizens and their property.
The Mercer Libertarians are setting up a new Facebook page for their group so that they can increase membership. Anyone interested in joining the group can look it up on Facebook for more information.