Adam Smith Foundation

From Judgepedia

The Adam Smith Foundation was established in Missouri as a 501(c)(4) organization dedicated to advocacy for conservative principles and individual liberty.

Mission

The Adam Smith Foundation focuses on promoting responsible conservatism and encouraging the protection of individual liberties. Primary concerns of the organization are judicial reform, tax and spending reform, education reform, government accountability, and the protection of private property from eminent domain abuse. ^[1]

Advocacy

In the area of judicial reform, the Adam Smith Foundation advocates the elimination of judicial activism and legislating from the bench. The Foundation also supports changing the Missouri Plan for electing judges, a system which was meant to provide for a non-partisan method for selecting judges but which has instead allowed special interest groups to infiltrate the nominating committee, over-politicizing the system without allowing elected officials to have enough power to ensure that the nominating committee is acting in the best interests of the citizens of Missouri. ^[2]

In the area of taxation and spending, the Foundation supports the elimination of the State Income Tax, as well as the passage of measures to strengthen Missouri's Hancock Amendment. The Adam Smith Foundation opposes pork projects and earmarks as wasteful spending of taxpayer money that would be put to more use if refunded to taxpayers. ^[3]

The Foundation believes that education reform is necessary to provide children with the best education possible. To do this, the Adam Smith Foundation advocates the elimination of wasteful bureaucratic and administrative spending, as well as the introduction of school choice and market-based reforms to increase competition between schools and thereby increase educational quality. ^[4]

The Adam Smith Foundation also advocates increased government accountability, such as exposing those who waste taxpayer money or misuse government resources and holding them accountable for their actions. The Foundation also supports the expansion of term limits in order to make sure that government does not stagnate by injecting fresh lawmakers with new ideas in the place of entrenched veteran lawmakers. ^[5]

Eminent domain abuse is another area in which the Adam Smith Foundation serves as an advocate for taxpayers. It is the Foundation's belief that eminent domain laws should not be used to allow private land to be taken for use by private developers who have teamed up with politicians. For this reason, the Adam Smith Foundation advocates for a strict interpretation of eminent domain law, eliminating its use as a tool to spur private development at taxpayer expense. ^[6]

External links

• Adam Smith Judicial Reform Page
• Here comes the judge (debate) one more time, Missouri could lose congressional seat, by Steve Kraske
• Grisham's Judicial Appeal, by Colin Levy of the Wall Street Journal
• Show Me Better Judges, by Paul Jacob from Human Events

References