It’s no secret that America is dangerously divided right now. But there is a broad area of agreement: polls conducted by a range of polling firms throughout 2021 show around 70% of us, both pre- and post-election, believe that America is “on the wrong track,” and that the federal government no longer represents our interests. This is a good reason to start asking questions, without assuming we know the “real” answers. Why are we so worried? Why are so many of us so angry? What do we experience as the problems? What’s causing these problems, including ever-growing inequality of opportunity, political division, unrest, and pessimism? How should we fix them – or should we even try?

To begin with the last question, it seems to me two broad categories of response have emerged with particular clarity in the last five years or so. One requires that we declare the American experiment in creating a self-governing society a failure, and learn to live with (if not profit from) the devolution of democracy: blow it up in favor of either authoritarian or mob rule, or a combination of both.

The other approach requires that we look for answers to all the other questions, and for solutions that support the kind of society the founders imagined. This demands a lot of study, work, and thought, so I’ll set it aside for now.

There are two factions working against self-governance and the rule of law: libertarians who value personal freedom over the common good; and kleptocrats for whom rules and the common good are barriers to their accumulation of wealth and power. I’ll set the kleptocrats aside for a while, too.

It’s surprising in some ways that New Hampshire turns out to be such a good vantage from which to the see the blossoming of libertarianism. The colony of NH produced the first written constitution on the continent in 1774. It begins, “All men are born equally free and independent; Therefore, all government of right originates from the people, is founded in consent, and instituted for the general good.” Article 3 goes on, “When men enter into a state of society, they surrender up some of their natural rights to that society, in order to ensure the protection of others; and, without such an equivalent, the surrender is void.” The 1784 Constitution for the State of NH expands on the original, enumerating and codifying the rights and responsibilities of citizens, and the structures and boundaries of governmental bodies.

Two hundred and fifty years later, a group of libertarian State Representatives in positions of leadership argued against mask mandates as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic, claiming that “it is not the government’s job to protect citizens.” This is clearly an anti-constitutional notion, based on a set of anti-government beliefs: taxes are theft; government mandates are tyranny; government can’t do anything right.

How did this kind of ideology find such a strong foothold in “first in the nation primary” New Hampshire, the state with the highest ratio of citizen-to-elected-official representation in the union? The answer is complex, and will require a few weeks to dig into, but it is a good, clear window into what has happened and is happening throughout the country.

First, New Hampshire is beautiful. There are forests, mountain ranges, and a 17-mile strip of Atlantic coastline. People who love nature want to come here, and people who prize independence and privacy above all can find lots of space for themselves. Fewer than a million and a half people live here, and most of them are concentrated in three cities that form the Central Corridor. This was a big selling point for anti-government activists calling themselves the Free State Project (FSP). The founder of the FSP is Jason Sorens, who bears an uncanny resemblance to the infamous and incarcerated “Pharma Bro.” He is now a professor at St. Anselm College, but began this effort in the early 2000s as a graduate student at Yale who came to believe in Ayn Rand-style radical individualism. He wrote in the July 2001 edition of Libertarian Enterprise, “Libertarian activists need to face a somber reality: nothing’s working.” He proposed that “freedom-minded people of all stripes (libertarians, anarchocapitalists, pacifists, even people who just call themselves liberals or conservatives) become residents of a small state, take over the state government, then cut taxes, shrink budgets, scrap regulations and expand personal freedom.” (NH Business Review 10/28/21)

After a decade of organizing, 20,000 liberty-loving people from all over the country pledged to move here to take over and dismantle state and local governments. So far, 2,000 of the 20,000 who signed the pledge have actually shown up, and another 3,000 or so residents have aligned themselves with the FSP. Dr. Sorens quickly stepped back from his original plan to use threat of secession as a lever to discourage federal government interference, and in recent years has adapted the project to the reality that political movements fail when there’s no leadership, no plan, and no financing. ­­­­­­­­­­­­­

The failure of Grafton, NH’s Free Town Project of 2004 was instructive. When a group of survivalists and other radical libertarians infiltrated the town government, voted to cut budgets for “unnecessary” services like street lights, fire fighters, and road repairs, and instituted an anything-goes-culture, fires burned down buildings unchecked, trash piled up, town meetings became chaotic, and all sense of community eroded. And, as recounted in A Libertarian Walks into a Bear, by Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling, the proliferation of trash invited an invasion of bears that was the last straw for many townspeople. After 10 years of this kind of “freedom,” people who appreciate the nature and importance of good governance took the reins again, and Grafton has regained most of its old vitality.

With lessons learned, though, the effort to create a libertarian utopia here continues to move forward. As of 2020, FSP adherents have come to occupy the most powerful positions in state government – leadership in the House, Senate, Governor’s office, and Executive Council.

They continue to make laws that are seriously eroding public education and threatening to bankrupt cities and towns, which will be forced to spend property tax dollars (the major revenue source for all public services in NH) on school vouchers for private, parochial, and home schooling. This demands the question, “How did this happen? How did these disorganized, undisciplined, chaotic anti-government extremists with ties to white supremacists, survivalists, and conspiracy theorists, end up with so much political power?” The short answer is that they sold out to some very willing buyers.

More on that next week.

Jean Lewandowski is a resident of Nashua.