# A Time for Truth *Published 1978 by Reader's Digest Press (distributed by McGraw-Hill). 260 pages. Author: [[William E. Simon]], 63rd United States Secretary of the Treasury (1974–1977), serving under Nixon and Ford. Ghostwritten by libertarian author Edith Efron. Forewords by [[Milton Friedman]] and [[Friedrich Hayek]]. A surprise bestseller that became the founding manifesto of conservative donor strategy — the book that told wealthy conservatives to stop complaining about liberal institutional dominance and start building a parallel intellectual infrastructure to displace it.* ## The argument ### The government critique The book's first two-thirds are a sharp critique of government economic policy, drawn from Simon's experience as Treasury Secretary and as the head of the Federal Energy Office during the 1973 oil crisis. Simon argues that government intervention in the economy — price controls, regulation, progressive taxation, welfare programs, deficit spending — is systematically destructive: it distorts markets, creates dependency, stifles innovation, and concentrates power in a bureaucratic elite that is accountable to no one. The critique is standard laissez-faire economics, delivered with the authority of a man who had held the highest economic policy position in the government and concluded that the government was the problem. Simon styled himself as a classical liberal in the Hayekian tradition: "There is only one social system that reflects the sovereignty of the individual: the free-market, or capitalist, system." The Friedman and Hayek forewords were not decorative. They were credentialing acts — two Nobel-caliber economists (Friedman won in 1976; Hayek in 1974) endorsing Simon's populist translation of their academic arguments. The book was designed to bridge the gap between academic free-market economics and a general readership of businesspeople, donors, and conservative activists. ### The manifesto chapter The book's final chapter is what makes it a KB-significant document. Simon turned his analysis from government policy to the institutional landscape of American intellectual life, and issued a **call to action** for conservative philanthropy: **The diagnosis:** American intellectual institutions — universities, think tanks, foundations, media organizations, publishing houses — were dominated by liberal and left-liberal perspectives. This dominance was not accidental; it was the result of decades of philanthropic investment by liberal foundations (Ford, Rockefeller, Carnegie) that had systematically funded institutions, scholars, and projects aligned with their worldview. The liberal intellectual establishment was not organically grown — it was *built*, with money and strategic intent. **The prescription:** Conservative donors needed to stop funding liberal institutions (including universities that taught perspectives hostile to capitalism) and start building a **conservative counterintelligentsia** — a parallel infrastructure of think tanks, policy institutes, journals, media outlets, and academic programs that would develop, promote, and implement free-market and socially conservative ideas with the same strategic intent that liberal philanthropy had used. **The specific calls:** - Fund think tanks that develop conservative policy alternatives (Simon sat on the boards of [[Heritage Foundation]] and [[Hoover Institution]]) - Fund academic chairs, centers, and programs at universities that would teach free-market economics and conservative political philosophy - Fund media organizations and publications that would amplify conservative arguments - Fund legal organizations that would litigate conservative constitutional positions - Most importantly: fund *strategically*, with the intent to build institutional power, not merely to write checks for tax deductions ### The connection to the Powell Memo Simon's manifesto chapter is the donor-class operationalization of the analysis [[Lewis Powell]] presented in the [[Powell Memo]] (1971). Powell, writing seven years before Simon, identified the same problem: liberal institutional dominance threatening the free-enterprise system. Powell's memo was addressed to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and proposed a strategy for business engagement in intellectual and political life. Simon's book was addressed to wealthy individual donors and proposed a strategy for personal philanthropic engagement. The two documents are complementary: Powell provided the strategic analysis; Simon provided the call to arms for the donor class. Together, they are the founding documents of the conservative institutional-building project that produced [[Heritage Foundation]], the [[Federalist Society]], the [[John M. Olin Foundation]], the [[Bradley Foundation]], the [[Scaife-Mellon Family]]'s media and think-tank investments, and the broader [[Koch Network]]. ## The Simon legacy Simon practiced what he preached. As president of the [[John M. Olin Foundation]] (1977–2000), he directed hundreds of millions of dollars into the conservative counterintelligentsia project: - **Law and economics programs** at elite law schools (Chicago, Yale, Harvard, Stanford, Virginia) — funding that built the intellectual foundation for the [[Federalist Society]]'s judicial revolution - **Conservative academic centers** — including the [[John M. Olin]] Center for Inquiry into the Theory and Practice of Democracy at the University of Chicago - **Think tanks** — major funding to [[Heritage Foundation]], [[American Enterprise Institute]], [[Manhattan Institute]], [[Hoover Institution]] - **Conservative publications** — funding for journals, magazines, and media organizations The Olin Foundation, under Simon's direction, was arguably the single most strategically consequential conservative philanthropic institution of the late 20th century. It was deliberately structured with a sunset clause — the foundation spent down its endowment and closed in 2005, on the theory that living donors should direct their own giving rather than leaving it to future trustees who might drift from the founder's intent. ## KB significance **1. The counterintelligentsia manifesto.** *A Time for Truth* is the founding document of the conservative donor-strategy that the KB documents across dozens of entries. Every KB entry about conservative think tanks, donor networks, foundation funding, and institutional-building traces back to the strategic framework Simon articulated here — and that he personally implemented through the [[John M. Olin Foundation]]. **2. The Powell Memo complement.** Powell provided the analysis; Simon provided the action plan for wealthy individuals. Together, these two documents explain *why* the conservative institutional infrastructure was built and *how* the donor class was mobilized to build it. The KB's [[Powell Memo]] entry documents the strategy; this entry documents its translation into philanthropic practice. **3. The Olin Foundation prototype.** Simon's management of the Olin Foundation — strategic, mission-driven, focused on institutional influence, structured to prevent mission drift — established the model that subsequent conservative foundations followed. The [[Bradley Foundation]], the [[Scaife-Mellon Family]]'s foundations, and the [[Koch Network]]'s philanthropic apparatus all built on the Olin model. **4. The Friedman/Hayek bridge.** The book's forewords by [[Milton Friedman]] and [[Friedrich Hayek]] are historically significant: they represent the moment when academic free-market economics explicitly endorsed the project of building a conservative counterintelligentsia. The endorsement bridges the gap between economic theory ([[Capitalism and Freedom]], [[The Road to Serfdom]]) and political-institutional strategy. **5. The "build, don't complain" ethos.** Simon's core message — stop lamenting liberal institutional dominance and start building alternatives — is the ethos that distinguishes [[Movement Conservatism]] from earlier American conservatism. The [[Old Right Ecosystem]] complained about liberal institutions; Simon's generation built replacements. This shift from grievance to construction is the defining strategic innovation of the modern American right. ## See Also - [[William E. Simon]] — the author; Treasury Secretary; Olin Foundation president - [[Milton Friedman]] — wrote the foreword; free-market economics - [[Friedrich Hayek]] — wrote the foreword; classical liberal philosophy - [[Powell Memo]] — the complementary strategic analysis - [[Lewis Powell]] — the Powell Memo's author - [[Movement Conservatism]] — the institutional project Simon helped build - [[Heritage Foundation]] — a think tank Simon funded and served - [[Hoover Institution]] — a think tank Simon served - [[John M. Olin Foundation]] — the foundation Simon directed - [[Bradley Foundation]] — a successor in the strategic-philanthropy model - [[Scaife-Mellon Family]] — a parallel donor family - [[Koch Network]] — a successor donor network - [[Charles Koch]] — a parallel donor-strategist - [[Leonard Leo]] — the next-generation operationalizer of the same strategy - [[Federalist Society]] — the judicial institution that Olin Foundation funding helped build - [[Neoliberalism]] — the economic ideology - [[Free Market Fundamentalism]] — the ideological endpoint - [[Supply-Side Economics]] — the policy translation - [[Capitalism and Freedom]] · [[The Road to Serfdom]] · [[Free to Choose]] — the intellectual canon Simon popularized