REASON Profile: Jerome Tuccille

Jerome Tuccille, author of the popular HERE COMES IMMORTALITY (Stein and Day, 1973), sees no contradiction between the futuristic themes presented in that book and his libertarian political philosophy. "Futurism is a logical extension of libertarianism. Its basic thrust is toward human liberation from all tyrants, including death itself." But the future doesn't just happen—it's made by people, and to that end Mr. Tuccille is active in promoting his political values as the 1974 Free Libertarian Party candidate for Governor of New York. "I have always been optimistic, but never more so than at present. I believe we can achieve many of our goals within the next 10 years; discontent with Republicans and Democrats has never been higher. We are the only real alternative to politics-as-usual, and we have a golden opportunity to convince the American public of this."

Thirty-seven year-old Tuccille received his B.S. in psychology from Manhattan College in 1959 with plans to become a full-time author. Although he hasn't achieved that goal completely (he works as a sales manager for Metromedia, Inc.) his output has been impressive. In addition to articles for the NEW YORK TIMES, FREEMAN, NEW GUARD, LIBERTARIAN FORUM, and other publications, Jerry has also written RADICAL LIBERTARIANISM (Bobbs-Merrill, 1970), IT USUALLY BEGINS WITH AYN RAND (Stein and Day, 1971), and edited (with Murray Rothbard) THE RIGHT WING INDIVIDUALIST TRADITION IN AMERICA. His forthcoming book, WHO'S AFRAID OF 1984? will be published by Arlington House next year. Mr. Tuccille will be listed in the new edition of WHO'S WHO IN AMERICA, and he has taught at the New School for Social Research and lectured at various universities. He has also appeared on various television shows around the country.

Jerry's interests (in addition to his wife Maria and their two young children) include reading—especially Hemingway, Rabelais, Voltaire, Mencken, Evelyn Waugh, Tom Wolfe, and James Dickey—camping, playing tennis, the seashore, and watching boxing matches and bullfights, as well as politics and futurism.

In his view there are three basic means to achieve a libertarian society: "education through books, articles and media publicity; self-liberation through tax resistance, draft resistance (when it was necessary), etc.; and the creation of a broad-based, independent libertarian movement via the Libertarian Party. We have to get out into the political arena and convince the public we are right!"