Many are asking what next? Prayerfully ponder this ‘vision’ as an action item in your own state. Let’s help one another and keep it grassroots oriented as we go!
The Gold State Initiative
The Vision
The goal of the Gold State Initiative is to restore Liberty to America by restoring Liberty to the States. Rather than focusing on Federal elections where voter impact is negligible, the Liberty Movement shifts its focus to State, Sheriffs, County and Municipal races which are closer, and more responsive, to voters.
As the State Legislatures and statewide offices are filled with principled, Liberty-lovers, they change their States’ laws to support Liberty. At the same time, they wield the Tenth Amendment to the US Constitution like a patriotic ax to nullify all Federal overreach and to restore State Sovereignty.
Free States will be come magnets of opportunity, attracting the best and the brightest from around the nation to exercise their creativity, initiative and entrepreneurship. They will rapidly recover from the economic depression caused by government regulation and fiat money business cycles, becoming oases of opportunity.
We begin this process by focusing on our own States, our own lands of opportunity. And as Americans, we share what we learn in the process to challenge and assist other States to do the same. The extent to which we are successful is the extent to which we restore both the American Dream America as a beacon of hope to the rest of the world.
Transforming Your State into a Free State
Two interrelated projects will be used to transform a State into a Free State. First, we need to shift the conversation about government policy to a plan to restore Liberty in every area. Second, we need to recruit and elect to a majority of elective offices principled Liberty candidates pledged to this platform.
The nexus of this effort is the Liberty Platform. This platform will be a comprehensive, principled plan to transform the State. We will enlist the best minds from across the State and from around the nation to develop this plan. The platform will be tailored to the specific offices involved – Legislative, County, Sheriff and Municipal. Every issue needs to be examined for its constitutionality and economic effects.
The Liberty Platform, and its development, will be publicized by every means available. All publicity will be accompanied by a call for men and women of good will and accomplishment to run for office on this platform. Candidates who endorse this platform will be vetted at a basic level to make sure they get the State’s leadership stamp of approval. More than one candidate may be approved for any office. Candidates can be of any party or independents. We will assist all candidates and other spokesmen with the tools they need to publicize the Platform.
Since there has been no effort like this in recent history, the effort itself will be newsworthy. Many of the proposals will be radically at odds with the status quo, and will provoke discussion. This discussion is necessary to shift the conversation. Our model is the work Ron Paul has done to take the Federal Reserve from an obscure issue with little public understanding, to a front burner topic today in the last five year.
The Gold State Initiative (GSI)
Why do we call this initiative “Gold State”? Since Liberty is the Gold Standard of politics, a free State will be neither blue nor red, but Gold! Our plan is to make the majority of the nation’s states Gold States, leading the way to a re-birth of Liberty and its concomitants, Peace and Prosperity.
Conceivably a four-year effort can gain the majority in most State governments. Announce of our inception in Fall, 2012. The Liberty Movement developing in each State can provide the infrastructure for political organizing. The GSI in each state will be focused primarily on Platform development, candidate recruitment and support, and public relations.
Since GSI will be a combination think-tank and political action committee, we should investigate multiple tax status – 501 c(3), 501 c(4) and a political action committee. We should let operational economy be our primary concern. Below is a suggested timeline for each state’s Gold State Initiative.
Fall of 2012
- Recruit board and staff.
- Set up website.
- Sketch outlines of Platform. Locate low-hanging fruit like the drug war, war on terror/the people, etc.
- Create a wiki approach to developing the Platform, enlisting statewide citizen input.
- Outreach to university economics and political science professors with term paper ideas.
- Contact existing think tanks, state and national, existing ideas to incorporate.
- Contact scholars like Tom Woods and Andrew Napolitano as advisory board members.
- Put out call for candidates.
- Fund-raising.
2013
- Release initial Platform. Explain it is a dynamic process.
- Make sample platform planks to submit to political party precinct, county, district and state meetings.
- Start Speakers’ Bureau.
- Put out call for candidates for 2014 races. Recruit all the way into 2014.
- Speak to current issues, as they arise in the news and in the legislature.
2014
- Continue to promote the Platform and recruit candidates as needed.
- After the elections, analyze our performance, make adjustments, and set the process in motion for 2016.
Now is the time to get started in your state.
The GSI in each state is necessarily a grassroots effort. It is the logical place for the Liberty Movement to shift its focus after the Ron Paul campaign.
Porter Davis Blog — NEWS, COMMENTARY AND OPINION FROM A CHRISTIAN, LIBERTARIAN, CONSTITUTIONAL PERSPECTIVE. ISAIAH 21:6 Mr. Davis serves on the board for R3publicans.