Libertarian candidate for governor Eric Cooper held a presentation in the Memorial Union Thursday about the philosophies and intellectual beliefs of libertarianism as the second part of his two-day visit to Iowa State this week. Cooper made a campaign speech at the Ames Public Library on Tuesday.

His lecture was not an attempt to appeal to student voters, but rather to inform them on the beliefs of Libertarians.

“One of the many reasons libertarianism isn’t completely a part of the widespread political spectrum is because of how little people know about it,” said Cooper, vice president of Iowa’s Libertarian Party and ISU associate professor of psychology. “I’m not here to convert anyone, but to help people understand what libertarians believe when it comes to the issues of today.”

Libertarianism is a political philosophy which emphasizes personal and economic freedom, while deemphasizing the role of the central government, Cooper said..

“According to Libertarians, the government is responsible for four things, and only four things,” Cooper said. “Protecting the people from body crimes, protecting the people from property crimes, enforcing the terms of contracts, and providing certain public goods. These are the government’s responsibility either because they require force to ensure that they are present, or because the free market wouldn’t normally provide these things. Libertarians believe that if the government is doing anything beyond those four things, they’re doing too much.”

“One of the problems people have with putting Libertarians on the political spectrum is because we share beliefs with both the left and the right,” Cooper said. “For example, Libertarians are proponents of gay marriage and marijuana use, and we are against policies like the draft, like the Democrats. But we are also for unregulated markets, and are against property and graduated income taxes as well as policies like the smoking ban, like Republicans.”

“What gets people confused about libertarianism is that we take those beliefs we share with the left and right to more extremes than they do,” Cooper said. “While Democrats may be for the use of medical marijuana, Libertarians take it to the next level. Anything someone wants to do with marijuana for personal use, we’re fine with. At the same time, while Republicans are for the lowering of income and property taxes, Libertarians want them abolished altogether.”

Famous Libertarians or historical figures with Libertarian ideals include Thomas Jefferson, Calvin Coolidge, Grover Cleveland and James Buchanan. Libertarian celebrities of today include Clint Eastwood, Kurt Russell, Drew Carey and the creators of “South Park,” Trey Parker and Matt Stone.

“Libertarianism can be described simply as anything that’s peaceful,” Cooper said. “If you want to do something that doesn’t hurt anyone else, you should be able to do it, whether that be smoking, marijuana, junk food, etc. That’s what libertarianism is.”

Cooper is the Libertarian candidate for governor of Iowa during the upcoming election, but Cooper isn’t too concerned with winning.

“Our goal is not to win this election. That’s just not going to happen. All I’m trying to do is get 2 percent of the vote. If we can do that, Libertarians will get major party status under Iowa Law,” Cooper said. “If we are successful, it would be the first time in Iowa History that the Libertarian Party has attained major party status. That would mean that we will have ballot access in Iowa without having to petition for it every election.”

The goal of the Libertarian Party is not to win elections, but to get 10 percent of the vote for our candidates on a regular basis,” Cooper said. “Because 10 percent of the vote is enough to decide the election between the major party candidates in most elections, Libertarians can force the major parties to adopt our issues in order to steal our voters. Third parties, notably the Populists in the 1890s and the Socialists in the 1910s, can get everything they want without winning elections if they can draw enough voters away from the major parties.”

“It’s very exciting right now,” Cooper said. “The results of the recent Des Moines Register Iowa poll on the Governor race show that we currently have the 2 percent we need to get major party status and the recent mock election of Des Moines High School students shows our support at 6 percent. But we’ll see how everything turns out very soon.”