The LP played only a marginal role in Dutch politics.
Van Houten disagreed with the political course of this new party especially where it came to economic policy and electoral law.
Van Houten had started out as an extremely progressive liberal,[1] who as an MP in the 1870s had initiated the first forms of social legislation and as a minister in the 1880s had reformed the electoral law.
In the 1910s he had become more conservative, opposing encroaching social legislation and the new electoral system.
The party platform was based on free market liberalism and opposition to the new electoral system in the Pacification of 1917.