Through direct contributions to carefully chosen intellectuals and institutions, they sought to facilitate the expression of unorthodox ideas in the national conversation, and thereby to provoke longterm ideological change. In contrast to other contemporary sources of funding, they did not expect any immediate tangible return for their investments. Instead, they attempted to support viewpoints that fell outside the po liti cal and academic mainstream, and they approached “the unique and unorthodox” as “an advantage, rather than a handicap.” In adopting this strategy, they demonstrated an extraordinary faith in the capacity of abstract ideas to generate substantive po liti cal change. These commitments remained central to the conservative movement in subsequent de cades and developed a palpable infl uence with the emergence of a new collection of lavishly funded think tanks in the 1970s and 1980s.

Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, loc. 322