November 10, 2005 | Read Time: 2 minutes
A Gift of Freedom: How the John M. Olin Foundation Changed America
by John J. Miller
In this book, John J. Miller, a writer for National Review and contributing editor at Philanthropy, makes the case that it is impossible not to attribute the ascendancy of conservatism in the United States today in part to the John M. Olin Foundation. “If the conservative intellectual movement were a Nascar race, and if the scholars and organizations who compose it were drivers zipping around a race track, virtually all of their vehicles at least would sport an Olin bumper sticker,” he says.
The author recounts how Mr. Olin, who made his fortune from his family’s munitions company, sought to transform his foundation, founded in 1953, from an “ordinary rich man’s charity” to a financier of ideas designed to save American free enterprise. The text discusses how Mr. Olin spent millions to advance the careers of people like Charles Murray, whose 1984 book Losing Ground helped usher in changes in federal welfare policies; Francis Fukuyama, who argued that liberal democracy had prevailed over alternative economic and political systems; and Allan Bloom, as he wrote his critique of higher education, The Closing of the American Mind.
Relying on interviews with people at the foundation and on archival research, Mr. Miller also examines how the foundation supported efforts by the Central Intelligence Agency to advance anti-Communist organizations and intellectuals in the cold war years and played a hand in founding institutions like the Heritage Foundation and the Federalist Society.
He also provides insights into why the foundation was so successful. Its united board, patient approach to grant making, and decision to spend itself out of existence, which is scheduled to occur by the end of this year, rather than operate in perpetuity are among the “eight simple rules” Mr. Miller credits for the foundation’s achievements.
Publisher: Encounter Books, 665 Third Street, Suite 330, San Francisco, Calif. 94107; (415) 538-1460 or (800) 786-3839; http://www.encounterbooks.com; 241 pages; $25.95; ISBN 1-59403-117-7.
