Liberty Fund

American private educational foundation

This article contains promotional content. Please help improve it by removing promotional language and inappropriate external links, and by adding encyclopedic text written from a neutral point of view. (April 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

|

Liberty Fund

Logo featuring the Sumerian word "Ama-gi", meaning "freedom"[1]

Founded| 1960; 65 years ago (1960)
Founder| Pierre F. Goodrich
Purpose| Educational
Location|

* 11301 N. Meridian Street, Carmel, IN 46032

Method| Publishing, conferences
Website| libertyfund.org

Liberty Fund, Inc. is an American nonprofit foundation[2] headquartered in Carmel, Indiana, that promotes the libertarian views of its founder, Pierre F. Goodrich, through publishing, conferences, and educational resources. The operating mandate of the Liberty Fund was set forth in an unpublished memo written by Goodrich "to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals".[3][4][5][2]

## History

[edit]

Liberty Fund was founded by entrepreneur Pierre F. Goodrich in 1960. Goodrich, "one of the richest men in Indiana", was involved with coal mines, corn production, telecommunications, and securities.[6] Goodrich was a member of the neoliberal or classically liberal Mont Pelerin Society, an international organization of academics, intellectuals, and business leaders who advocated free market economic policies. Goodrich was also an acolyte of Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises.[7] Historian Donald T. Critchlow notes that Liberty Fund was one of the endowed conservative foundations that laid the way for the election of U.S. President Ronald Reagan in 1980.[8]

In 1997, the fund received an $80 million donation from Goodrich's wife, Enid, increasing its assets to over $300 million.[5][9] In November 2015, the fund announced the construction of a $22 million headquarters in Carmel, Indiana.[6][10]

## Projects

[edit]

This article is part of a series on

Conservatism
in the United States

Schools

* Compassionate
* Fiscal
* Fusion
* Liberal
* Classical
* Libertarian
* Moderate
* Movement
* Nationalist
* Christian
* Neo-
* Paleo-
* Postliberal
* Populist
* Progressive
* Social
* Straussian
* Traditionalist
* Ultra-

Principles

* American exceptionalism
* Anti-communism
* Christian Zionism
* Communitarianism
* Constitutionalism
* Familialism
* Family values
* Federalism
* States' rights
* Subsidiarity
* Gender essentialism
* Judeo-Christian values
* Individualism
* Law and order
* Limited government
* Meritocracy
* Natural aristocracy
* Militarism
* Peace through strength
* Moral absolutism
* Natalism
* Pro-life
* Natural law
* Ordered liberty
* Patriotism
* Property rights
* Republicanism
* Right to bear arms
* Rule of law
* Supply-side economics
* Tradition

History

* Loyalists
* Federalist Era
* Southern chivalry
* Redeemers
* Boston Brahmins
* Solid South
* New Humanism
* Dunning School
* Southern Agrarians
* Old Right
* Conservative Manifesto
* Conservative coalition
* America First Committee
* McCarthyism
* Goldwater campaign
* New Right
* Reagan era
* Reagan Doctrine
* Reaganomics
* Republican Revolution
* W. Bush presidency
* Tea Party movement
* Neo- vs. paleoconservatism
* Trump era
* First term
* Second term
* Agenda 47

Intellectuals

* Adams
* Anton
* Babbitt
* Bacevich
* Bell
* Bellow
* Bloom
* Boorstin
* Bradford
* Buckley
* Burgess
* Burnham
* Calhoun
* Chambers
* Conquest
* Deneen
* Eliot
* Francis
* Genovese
* Gottfried
* Hanson
* Hardin
* Hazony
* Himmelfarb
* Hoppe
* Hurston
* Jaffa
* Kimball
* Kirk
* Kirkpatrick
* Kreeft
* Kristol
* Kuehnelt-Leddihn
* Lind
* Lovecraft
* Loury
* Lukacs
* Luntz
* Mansfield
* Mencken
* Meyer
* Molnar
* Murray
* Nisbet
* Pangle
* Ransom
* Reno
* Rieff
* Santayana
* Schaeffer
* Sowell
* Strauss
* Vermeule
* Viereck
* Voegelin
* Wattenberg
* Weaver
* Wolfe

Politicians

* Abbott
* Adams (John)
* Adams (John Quincy)
* Bolton
* Buchanan
* Bush (George H. W.)
* Bush (George W.)
* Calhoun
* Clay
* Cheney
* Cleveland
* Coolidge
* Cruz
* DeSantis
* Dirksen
* Dole
* Eisenhower
* Gingrich
* Goldwater
* Harding
* Hamilton
* Helms
* Hoover (Herbert)
* Huckabee
* Johnson
* Kissinger
* Lodge
* Luce
* Madison
* McCain
* McCarthy (Joseph)
* McCarthy (Kevin)
* McConnell
* McKinley
* Meese
* Nixon
* Palin
* Paul (Rand)
* Paul (Ron)
* Pawlenty
* Pence
* Pierce
* Randolph
* Reagan
* Romney
* Rubio
* Rumsfeld
* Ryan
* Sherman
* Taft (Robert)
* Taft (William)
* Thurmond
* Trump
* Vance
* Wallace
* Wolfowitz

Jurists

* Alito
* Barrett
* Bork
* Burger
* Colson
* Field
* Frelinghuysen
* Fuller
* George
* Goldsmith
* Gorsuch
* Harlan
* Kavanaugh
* Kennedy
* Luttig
* O'Connor
* Parker
* Rehnquist
* Roberts (John)
* Sanford
* Scalia
* Sessions
* Sutherland
* Taft (William)
* Thomas (Clarence)
* Whittaker

Commentators

* Beck
* Bongino
* Breitbart
* Buchanan (Pat)
* Buckley
* Caldwell
* Carlson
* Cass
* Chodorov
* Coulter
* D'Souza
* Derbyshire
* Dreher
* Elder
* Goldberg
* Grant
* Griffin
* Van den Haag
* Hannity
* Hart
* Herberg
* Hoover (Margaret)
* Ingraham
* Jones
* Kelly
* Knowles
* Krauthammer
* Lahren
* Levin
* Limbaugh
* Mac Donald
* Neuhaus
* Ngo
* North
* Novak
* O'Reilly
* Owens
* Podhoretz
* Pool
* Portnoy
* Possony
* Prager
* Robertson
* Shapiro
* Shlaes
* Sullivan
* Walsh
* Watters
* Weyl
* Will
* Wintrich
* Woods

Activists

* Abramoff
* Agostinelli
* Andreessen
* Atwater
* Bannon
* Bennett
* Bezmenov
* Bozell
* Cohn
* Dans
* Dobson
* Drudge
* Falwell
* Feulner
* Flynn
* Gabriel
* Hegseth
* Horowitz
* Kirk
* Krikorian
* Kristol
* LaHaye
* Lindell
* Lindbergh
* Leo
* McEntee
* Mercer (Rebekah)
* Mercer (Robert)
* Miller
* Murdoch
* Musk
* political views
* O'Keefe
* Park
* Phillips
* Posobiec
* Powell
* Raichik
* Reed
* Regnery
* Roberts (Kevin)
* Rove
* Rufo
* Scaife
* Schlafly (Andrew)
* Schlafly (Phyllis)
* Stone
* Thiel
* Thomas (Ginni)
* Weyrich
* Wiles
* Wood

Literature

* The Federalist Papers (1788)
* Democracy in America (1835–1840)
* Notes on Democracy (1926)
* I'll Take My Stand (1930)
* Our Enemy, the State (1935)
* The Managerial Revolution (1941)
* Ideas Have Consequences (1948)
* God and Man at Yale (1951)
* The Conservative Mind (1953)
* The Conscience of a Conservative (1960)
* A Choice Not an Echo (1964)
* A Conflict of Visions (1987)
* The Closing of the American Mind (1987)
* The Death of the West (2001)
* Hillbilly Elegy (2016)
* The Benedict Option (2017)
* Why Liberalism Failed (2018)
* The Age of Entitlement (2020)

Parties

Active

* American Party
* American Independent Party
* Conservative Party
* NY state
* Constitution Party
* Republican Party

Defunct

* Anti-Masonic Party
* Constitutional Union Party
* Democratic Party (historically, factions)
* Boll weevils
* Bourbon Democrats
* Conservative Democrats
* Dixiecrats
* Reagan Democrats
* Southern Democrats
* Rhode Island Suffrage Party
* Federalist Party
* National Republican Party
* Native American Party
* Whig Party

Think tanks

* Acton Institute
* AdTI
* AEI
* AFP
* CSP
* CfNI
* Claremont Institute
* CEI
* CSPC
* EPPC
* FRI
* Gatestone Institute
* Heartland Institute
* The Heritage Foundation
* Heritage Action
* Mandate for Leadership
* Project Esther
* Project 2025
* Hoover Institution
* Hudson Institute
* ISI
* James Madison Program
* Leadership Institute
* Manhattan Institute
* Mises Institute
* PRI
* PNAC (Defunct)
* Ripon Society
* R Street Institute
* Rockford Institute
* SPN
* Sutherland Institute
* Tax Foundation
* Witherspoon Institute

Media

Newspapers

* Chicago Tribune
* The Epoch Times
* New Hampshire Union Leader
* The Jewish Voice
* The New York Observer
* New York Post
* The Remnant
* The Wall Street Journal (editorial board)
* The Washington Times

Journals

* American Affairs
* The American Conservative
* The American Spectator
* American Thinker
* City Journal
* Claremont Review of Books
* Commentary
* Compact
* Chronicles
* The Dispatch
* First Things
* The Imaginative Conservative
* Jewish World Review
* Modern Age
* National Affairs
* The National Interest
* National Review
* The New American
* The New Atlantis
* The New Criterion
* Policy Review (defunct)
* Public Discourse
* Southern Partisan
* Spectator USA
* Tablet
* Taki's Magazine
* Telos
* Washington Examiner
* The Weekly Standard (defunct)

TV channels

* CBN
* Fox Business
* Fox News
* Newsmax TV
* One America News Network
* Real America's Voice
* VOZ

Websites

* 1819 News
* Babylon Bee
* Breitbart News
* The Bulwark
* Campus Reform
* The Center Square
* Conservative Review
* Daily Caller
* Daily Signal
* Daily Wire
* Discover the Networks
* The Federalist
* FrontPage Magazine
* Front Porch Republic
* Gateway Pundit
* Hot Air
* Human Events
* Independent Journal Review
* InfoWars
* Jihad Watch
* LifeZette
* NewsBusters
* PJ Media
* Rare
* RedState
* The Dispatch
* Townhall
* Twitchy
* Washington Examiner
* The Washington Free Beacon
* The Western Journal
* WorldNetDaily

Other

* Blaze Media
* Encounter Books
* Evie Magazine
* The First
* Imprimis
* The Political Cesspool
* Passage Publishing
* PragerU
* RealClearPolitics
* Red Scare
* Regnery Publishing
* RSBN
* The Rubin Report
* Sinclair Broadcast Group

Other organizations

Congressional caucuses

* Second Amendment Caucus
* RSC
* Liberty Caucus
* Freedom Caucus
* Republican Main Street Partnership
* Republican Governance Group
* Blue Dog Coalition

Economics

* ATR
* Club for Growth
* FreedomWorks (defunct)
* NFIB
* NTU
* Tea Party Patriots
* USCC

Gun rights

* GOA
* NAGR
* NRA

Identity politics

* ACT!
* CWA
* Council of Conservative Citizens
* GAG
* IWF
* LCR
* Moms for Liberty

Nativist

* CIS
* FAIR
* Immigration Restriction League
* NumbersUSA
* Patriot Prayer
* Proud Boys
* Oath Keepers
* Three Percenters

Religion

* ADF
* Court cases
* ACLJ
* AFA
* The American TFP
* Chalcedon Foundation
* CCA
* Christian Voice
* Eagle Forum
* FCR
* The Fellowship
* FFC
* Focus on the Family
* Foundation for Moral Law
* Liberty Counsel
* Moral Majority (defunct)
* NOM
* NRLC
* PTMC
* Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America
* Thomas More Law Center

Watchdog groups

* AIM
* Econ Journal Watch
* Franklin News Foundation
* JW
* MRC
* O'Keefe Media Group
* Project Veritas

Youth/student groups

* NJC
* TPUSA
* Young Americans for Freedom
* Young America's Foundation
* YAL

Social media

* Gab
* Gettr
* Parler
* The Right Stuff

Miscellaneous

* The 85 Fund
* AHI
* ACU
* AFPAC
* Bradley Foundation
* TCC
* CNP
* CPAC
* Hillsdale College
* IFF
* JBS
* John M. Olin Foundation (defunct)
* Liberty Fund
* LU
* NAS
* Philadelphia Society
* Regent University
* Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal
* TPPF

Other

* AFL
* Atlas Network
* CN
* ConservAmerica
* Donors Trust
* FedSoc
* NCPAC
* PJI
* Turning Point Action
* SACR
* YRNF
* Ziklag

Movements

* Asian and Pacific Islander
* Black
* Christian right
* Reconstructionism
* Classical education movement
* Paideia
* Dark Enlightenment
* Election denial movement
* 2020 election disputes
* Female
* Green
* Hispanic and Latino
* LGBTQ
* Libertarian republicans
* Militia movement
* Monarchism
* Mormon
* White Horse Prophecy
* Theodemocracy
* New Apostolic Reformation
* Parental rights movement
* Fathers' rights
* Patriot movement
* Christian
* Radical right
* Reactionary feminism
* Right-libertarianism
* Paleolibertarianism
* Secessionism
* Neo-Confederates
* in Texas
* Trumpism
* Never Trump

Related

* Barstool conservatism
* Bibliography of US conservatism
* Conservative talk radio
* GOP factions
* List of American conservatives
* NatCon
* Timeline of modern American conservatism

* Conservatism portal
* United States portal

* v
* t
* e

The foundation has published several books covering history, politics, philosophy, law, education, and economics. These include:

* Liberty Fund's Natural Law and Enlightenment Series
* Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America (Historical-Critical Edition) ISBN 978-0865978409[11]
* The Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Glasgow Edition) ISBN 978-0865973695
* David Ricardo, On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, 2010. ISBN 978-0865979659[11]
* The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo (Edited by Piero Sraffa and Maurice Dobb, 2005) ISBN 978-0865979765

### Conference program

[edit]

Since its inception, Liberty Fund has hosted more than 6,000 small, Socratic conferences, holding these conferences primarily in North America, Europe, and Latin America. It has also held a small number of conferences in other regions of the world, including Asia, Australia, and North Africa. Conferences are organized primarily by scholars who work with Liberty Fund staff to establish a theme and select readings that explore certain aspects of liberty. Conference subject areas have included economics, history, philosophy, religion, literature, law, and, most recently, genomics and artificial intelligence.

Individual conferences cover a broad range of topics and themes, including political theory and history, economics, literature, fine arts, science and technology, and law. Authors and thinkers discussed include William Shakespeare, Miguel de Cervantes, Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, Fredrick Douglass, and economists Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman, and James Buchanan. Past conference titles include "Freedom and Rebellion in Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov", "Wisdom, Knowledge and the Good Life", "Hobbes, Liberty, and the Rule of Law", "Liberty and Power in the Mexican Revolution", and "Civil Society in the Plague Year".

Major contributions to specific intellectual disciplines have been a series of conferences led by economists James Buchanan, Gordon Tullock, and Geoffrey Brennan on Public Choice Theory. Professor Henry Manne spearheaded conferences from the late 1970s to the early 2000s that made a considerable contribution to the field of Law and Economics. Scholars William B. Allen, Forrest McDonald, Lance Banning, Gordon S. Wood, and Jack P. Green have served as either directors or discussion leaders of dozens of conferences on the early history of the American Republic.[12]

### Publishing program

[edit]

Liberty Fund's publishing program began in 1971 with the publication of Education in a Free Society, coauthored by Goodrich and Wabash College professor Benjamin A. Rogge, a founding director of Liberty Fund.[13] Since then, Liberty Fund has published more than 400 books exploring the idea of liberty across many disciplines, including economics, political thought, American history, law, and education.[14] As part of Liberty Fund's commitment to the exchange of ideas, Liberty Fund keeps in print many titles that would otherwise be unavailable.

Some of its most popular or influential publications include:

* The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison (ed. by George W. Carey and James McClellan)
* The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smith
* Leisure, the Basis of Culture by Josef Pieper
* Liberty, Order, and Justice by James McClellan
* Omnipotent Government by Ludwig von Mises

### Liberty Fund Online

[edit]

Besides its main website, the Liberty Fund hosts four websites, including:[15][16]

* Law & Liberty focuses on the classical liberal tradition of how law and political thought shapes a society of free and responsible persons. Articles and commentary are offered by leading scholars covering a range of legal issues, legal philosophy, and pedagogy. (www.lawliberty.org)
* The Online Library of Liberty is an extensive digital library of scholarly works focused on individual liberty and free markets. The OLL provides a curated collection of resources available at no charge. More than 2,000 works, often classic texts that are rare or unaffordable to most, are available for downloading. (oll.libertyfund.org)
* Adam Smith Works is an investigation of the scholarship of Adam Smith, the Scottish Enlightenment economist and philosopher. To further the exploration of Smith's works, Liberty Fund received a multi-million grant from the John Templeton Foundation in 2016[17] to spearhead conferences, host scholars, and create a website around Adam Smith's life and scholarship, notably Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) and Wealth of Nations (1776). The website includes educational tools for use by elementary, middle school, high school, and college students. It includes Smith's Lectures on Jurisprudence and writings on astronomy, ancient logic, and ancient physics. (www.adamsmithworks.org)
* The Library of Economics and Liberty (Econlib.org) with its podcast EconTalk[18][19][20] hosted by Russ Roberts long-time Stanford professor and current president of Jerusalem's Shalem College. For more than fifteen years, Roberts has interviewed several hundred scholars and thought leaders, including Mark Andreessen, Milton Friedman, Richard Epstein, Thomas Sowell, Cass Sunstein, Jeffrey Sachs, Anne Applebaum, Ronald Coase, Freeman Dyson, and Deirdre McCloskey. (www.econtalk.org)

### Intellectual Portrait Series

[edit]

Liberty Fund's Intellectual Portrait Series contains in-depth conversations with more than thirty of the world's leading academics in economics, political thought, law, and other disciplines. Liberty Fund also makes available detailed educational documentaries on Adam Smith and Friedrich Hayek and features historical overviews of the Industrial Revolution, Hong Kong, and the Constitution of the United States.[21]

## Reception

[edit]

In his book The Assault on Reason, former U.S. Vice President and presidential candidate Al Gore wrote that between 2002 and 2004, 97% of the attendees at Liberty Fund training seminars for judges were Republican administration appointees. Gore said that such conferences and seminars are one of the reasons that judges who regularly attend such conferences "are generally responsible for writing the most radical pro-corporate, antienvironmental, and activist decisions". Referring to what he calls the "Big Three"—the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment, George Mason University's Law & Economics Center, and the Liberty Fund—Gore adds, "These groups are not providing unbiased judicial education. They are giving multithousand-dollar vacations to federal judges to promote their radical right-wing agenda at the expense of the public interest."[22]

## See also

[edit]

Portals:

* Economics
* Liberalism
* Libertarianism

* Economic liberalism
* Libertarian conservatism
* Libertarianism in the United States
* Right-libertarianism

## References

[edit]

1. ^ The Ama-gi is interpreted by the Liberty Fund to be the earliest-known written appearance of the word "freedom", or "liberty", taken from a clay document written about 2300 BCE in the Sumerian city-state of Lagash. See: Logo Archived 2016-06-12 at the Wayback Machine
2. ^ a b Simon, Scott (March 28, 2009). "Sarah Palin as Dorothy? We're Not in Kansas". Weekend Edition – Saturday. NPR. Archived from the original on December 3, 2013. Retrieved September 8, 2013.
3. ^ Rojc, Philip (July 27, 2016). "Rightward, Ho! Ten Top Funders Behind the Surging Libertarian Movement". Inside Philanthropy. Archived from the original on September 4, 2017. Retrieved September 3, 2017.
4. ^ Knull, Morgan N. (September 23, 2011). "Goodrich, Pierre". First Principles. Archived from the original on October 22, 2018. Retrieved February 13, 2025.
5. ^ a b Robert T. Grimm (ed.), Notable American Philanthropists: Biographies of Giving and Volunteering, Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002, pp. 125–128
6. ^ a b Swiatek, Jeff. "Liberty Fund building $22M headquarters in Carmel". Indy Star. Archived from the original on January 6, 2016. Retrieved November 3, 2015.
7. ^ MacLean, Nancy (2018) [2017]. Democracy in Chains. Penguin Random House. p. 125\. ISBN 978-1101980972. OCLC 1029879485.
8. ^ Critchlow, Donald T. (2008) [2005]. Phyllis Schlafly and Grassroots Conservatism. Princeton University Press. p. 5\. ISBN 978-0691136240. OCLC 191755011.
9. ^ "Gift pulls Liberty out of shadows". Indianapolis Business Journal. IBJ Corporation. June 30, 1997. Archived from the original on September 24, 2015. Retrieved September 8, 2013. "Because the conferences are scattered across the globe and because they attract only elite thinkers, the fund attracts little attention in Indianapolis outside its Allison Pointe offices."
10. ^ "Liberty Fund". catalog.libertyfund.org. Archived from the original on March 26, 2017. Retrieved March 26, 2017.
11. ^ a b "Economics 101-03: History of Economic Thought Spring 2015" (PDF). California State University, Sacramento Department of Economics. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 26, 2017. Retrieved July 24, 2018.
12. ^ "Historic Documents Library: Founding Era | Constitution Center". National Constitution Center – constitutioncenter.org. Retrieved April 13, 2024.
13. ^ Starbuck, Dane (June 1, 2001). The Goodriches: An American Family. Liberty Fund Inc. pp. 416, 427–428\. ISBN 978-0865971844.
14. ^ "Home". Liberty Fund. Retrieved April 18, 2024.
15. ^ "Online Resources". Liberty Fund. Retrieved January 20, 2024.
16. ^ "About Liberty Fund". Liberty Fund. April 10, 2014. Archived from the original on October 16, 2018. Retrieved November 1, 2018.
17. ^ "Adam Smith's Enlightened World". John Templeton Foundation. Retrieved April 13, 2024.
18. ^ "The Case Against Sugar: Gary Taubes On EconTalk". The Foundation for Economic Education. February 13, 2017.
19. ^ "Liberty Fund Links". December 14, 2016. Archived from the original on March 26, 2017. Retrieved March 26, 2017.
20. ^ LCCN 2007-15993; OCLC 237794267, 750248783, 730302176; ISBN 978-0865976658, 978-0865976665
21. ^ Liberty Fund Books 2022 Catalogue (The Art of Conversation). Liberty Fund Books. 2022. p. 162.
22. ^ Gore, Al (2007). The Assault on Reason. Penguin Press. p. 234. ISBN 978-1594201226. "Liberty Fund"

## External links

[edit]

* Official website
* EDIRC listing (provided by RePEc)

Authority control databases

International|

* ISNI
* VIAF

National|

* United States
* Israel

Academics|

* CiNii

Other|

* Yale LUX

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template