Lewis Lehrman
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Lewis E. "Lew" Lehrman (born August 15, 1938, in
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Harrisburg is the capital city of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Dauphin County. With a population of 50,135 as of the 2021 census, Harrisburg is the 9th largest city and 15th largest municipality in Pe ...
) is an American investment banker, businessman, Republican politician,
economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...
, and historian who supports the ongoing study of
American history The history of the lands that became the United States began with the arrival of the first people in the Americas around 15,000 BC. Numerous indigenous cultures formed, and many saw transformations in the 16th century away from more densely ...
based on original source documents. He was presented the
National Humanities Medal The National Humanities Medal is an American award that annually recognizes several individuals, groups, or institutions for work that has "deepened the nation's understanding of the humanities, broadened our citizens' engagement with the human ...
at the White House in 2005 for his contributions to American History, the study of President
Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...
and monetary policy. He was a member of the Advisory Committee of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and the Lincoln Forum. Lehrman authored ''Lincoln at Peoria: The Turning Point'', (2008), ''Lincoln "by littles"'' (2013). ''Churchill, Roosevelt & Company'' (2017) and ''Lincoln & Churchill: Statesmen at War'' (2018). His works on monetary policy include ''True Gold Standard, Newly Revised and Enlarged, Second Edition'' (2012) and ''Money, Gold, and History'' (2013) as well as co-authoring ''Money and the Coming World Order'' (1976) and ''The Case for Gold'' (1982). Lehrman writes for the ''Lincoln Institute'' which has created websites on the 16th President. In 1982 Lehrman ran for
Governor of New York The governor of New York is the head of government of the U.S. state of New York. The governor is the head of the executive branch of New York's state government and the commander-in-chief of the state's military forces. The governor has ...
, in which he opposed Democratic candidate Mario Cuomo, losing the election by two percentage points. He is a senior partner at L. E. Lehrman & Co., an investment firm he established in 1981. He is also the chairman of the Lehrman Institute, a public policy research and grant making foundation founded in 1972. He and
Richard Gilder Richard Gilder Jr. (May 31, 1932 – May 12, 2020), was an American philanthropist and co-founder of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. He also headed the brokerage firm Gilder, Gagnon, Howe & Co., whose specialty is tradi ...
were awarded the
National Humanities Medal The National Humanities Medal is an American award that annually recognizes several individuals, groups, or institutions for work that has "deepened the nation's understanding of the humanities, broadened our citizens' engagement with the human ...
in an Oval Office ceremony on Thursday, November 10, 2005. The Medal was presented by President George W. Bush. He converted to Catholicism.


Early life and education

Lehrman was born on August 15, 1938, in
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Harrisburg is the capital city of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Dauphin County. With a population of 50,135 as of the 2021 census, Harrisburg is the 9th largest city and 15th largest municipality in Pe ...
, the son of Rose (Herman) and Benjamin Sachs Lehrman, who was chairman of the Rite-Aid Corporation. His family was Jewish. Lehrman attended The Hill School, a boarding school in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. Lehrman's involvement with the teaching of history began as a Carnegie Teaching Fellow at Yale University in 1960 and subsequently at
Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
, where he completed a
master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.
as a
Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...
Fellow.


Career

Lehrman is a former President of Rite Aid, a writer, businessman and an economic historian. Washington political columnists Evans and Novak reported that
Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 ...
considered naming him Secretary of the Treasury before selecting
Donald T. Regan Donald Thomas Regan (December 21, 1918 – June 10, 2003) was the 66th United States Secretary of the Treasury from 1981 to 1985 and the White House Chief of Staff from 1985 to 1987 under Ronald Reagan. In the Reagan administration, he advoca ...
. In his memoirs, Regan wrote that he was urged to "placate my critics by appointing Lewis Lehrman, a prominent New York conservative, as Deputy Secretary of the Treasury." Regan did not want to do so, writing: "Although Lehrman was a capable, even a brilliant, man, I declined. I knew that he and I would clash because he would not be content to take a backseat. I wanted an administrator, not a person with policy objectives of his own." Lehrman was also considered for the post of Treasury Undersecretary for Monetary Affairs. Secretary Regan preferred monetarist
Beryl Wayne Sprinkel Beryl Wayne Sprinkel (November 20, 1923 – August 22, 2009) was a Under Secretary for Monetary Affairs in the US Treasury from January 1981 to April 1985, and member of the Executive Office of the US President and chairman of the Council of Ec ...
. Unlike Sprinkel, Lehrman was critical of the floating exchange rate policies of
Milton Friedman Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and the ...
, the leading academic monetarist. Treasury Secretary Regan said he sought "the best monetarist I can get." Lehrman wrote several memos for President-elect Reagan on monetary and fiscal policy—including one entitled "The Struggle for Financial Order at the Onset of the Reagan Presidency". Another memo, co-authored by Congressmen David Stockman and
Jack Kemp Jack French Kemp (July 13, 1935 – May 2, 2009) was an American politician and a professional football player. A member of the Republican Party from New York, he served as Housing Secretary in the administration of President George H. W. Bu ...
, was entitled: "Avoiding a GOP Economic Dunkirk". Conservative columnists
Rowland Evans Rowland Evans Jr. (April 28, 1921 – March 23, 2001) was an American journalist. He was known best for his decades-long syndicated column and television partnership with Robert Novak, a partnership that endured, if only by way of a joint subsc ...
and Robert Novak wrote that "Stockman was deeply impressed by Lehrman's arguments and used them as the inspiration for his own more specific paper." Writing of the Lehrman memos, ''New York Times'' columnist Leonard Silk warned that if Lehrman was named to a Reagan Administration post, "this will point the direction in which the Reagan administration economic policy is moving. But it is not yet there and there is strong opposition among more traditional conservatives." With bank interest rates over 20 percent and annualized inflation rates approaching 15 percent, the economic emergency which Lehrman had first proposed and which had been subsequently endorsed by Stockman and Kemp was ultimately rejected. Rite Aid Corporation was an outgrowth of a family wholesale grocery business in central Pennsylvania, Louis Lehrman & Son, founded by Lehrman's grandfather Louis and expanded by his father Benjamin. On holidays as a teenager, Lehrman began part-time at the firm. He later worked summers and holidays at the company while continuing his education at Yale and Harvard before enlisting in the Army Reserves. In 1962 in Pennsylvania, the company began opening health and beauty stores; it was then a small-town competitor for both customers and store leases. Lehrman joined the company full-time in 1964—the same year the first Rite Aid pharmacy was opened in New York State. "Lehrman was forced to go from town to town, looking for older stores in downtown areas where landlords were more desperate for tenants, even unknowns," reported the ''New York Times''. "Having found a site, he and his partners would devote a Saturday in painting and remodeling (usually spending less than $10,000) and a Sunday to stocking shelves. On Monday, the store would be open for business." Rite Aid went public in a successful 1968 stock offering and continued expansion. At the time, with 32 percent of the company's stock, Lewis Lehrman was the company's president and largest stockholder. Alex Grass, Lehrman's brother-in-law brought into the business by Lehrman's father, was eventually named chief executive. Lehrman stepped down as Rite Aid president in 1977 and as chairman of the firm's executive committee in 1981, eventually severing all ties with the company. His role in what Lehrman called "help ngto build Rite Aid" became a political issue in Lehrman's 1982 New York State gubernatorial campaign when Grass, who was then the company's chairman and CEO, took issue with published articles that gave credit to Lehrman for the company's growth. ''New York Magazine's'' Michael Kramer interviewed Grass for a profile on Lehrman. Lehrman "wasn't the founder. I was," said Grass. After quoting Grass's version of the founding of Rite Aid, Kramer wrote: "Grass of course, is denigrating Lehrman, and as for the facts, they aren't facts at all, or at least they are disputed facts. They are disputed by a host of former and present Rite Aid officers and directors with whom I spoke." Kramer went on to quote other Rite Aid officers and directors. Lehrman "took a sleepy little company and breathed life into it," said one company director. Maxwell Rabb, a Rite Aid director and former ambassador to Italy, declared: "Lew's role was at least the equal of anyone else's." Lehrman was also a managing director of
Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment management and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in more than 41 countries and more than 75,000 employees, the fir ...
in the late 1980s. After Morgan Stanley, in 1991, he established an investment company, L.E. Lehrman & Co. He was also an investor in
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
's Arbusto Energy.


Gubernatorial campaign

Lehrman was the president of Rite Aid until 1977 and resigned from all positions in 1981 to run for governor of New York the following year. He said that "elective office is the only way to get things done." He was well known for wearing red
suspenders Suspenders (American English, Canadian English), or braces (British English, Australian English) are fabric or leather straps worn over the shoulders to hold up skirts or trousers. The straps may be elasticated, either entirely or only at attach ...
in his campaign commercials. On June 16, 1982, Lehrman was chosen as the official GOP designee for governorship, getting "68.88 percent of the weighted votes at a hectic meeting of the Republican State Committee in Manhattan." He would later win the primary and become the Republican candidate for governor. Popular historian Samuel G. Freedman wrote that "Lehrman's goals, the party went far beyond solvency or an orderly transfer of power. What was needed was a populist uprising with a manifesto to match. Lehrman planned to create both the same way he had created the Rite-Aid network, by driving to cities and towns and paying attention to Main Street." The Republican gubernatorial candidate came into conflict with some top Republican members of the legislature over his tax reduction program. Asked about their differences in the final ''Inside Albany'' debate, Lehrman said, "I've put this issue to the voters. I'm not putting it to the legislators. Who rules New York State, 211 legislators or 18 million free people? That's the question. Who rules the government of the State of New York? Is it owned and operated by the politicians and the bureaucrats, or is it owned for the purpose of benefiting the 18 million people who live here? That's the issue." Running on the lines of the Republican and Conservative Parties, Lehrman was defeated by then-
Lieutenant Governor A lieutenant governor, lieutenant-governor, or vice governor is a high officer of state, whose precise role and rank vary by jurisdiction. Often a lieutenant governor is the deputy, or lieutenant, to or ranked under a governor — a "second-in-comm ...
Mario Cuomo, 51–48%, far less than expected. Cuomo ran on the lines of the Democratic and
Liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * a supporter of liberalism ** Liberalism by country * an adherent of a Liberal Party * Liberalism (international relations) * Sexually liberal feminism * Social liberalism Arts, entertainment and m ...
Parties, after defeating
New York City Mayor The mayor of New York City, officially Mayor of the City of New York, is head of the executive branch of the government of New York City and the chief executive of New York City. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property ...
Edward I. Koch Edward Irving Koch ( ; December 12, 1924February 1, 2013) was an American politician, lawyer, political commentator, film critic, and television personality. He served in the United States House of Representatives from 1969 to 1977 and was mayo ...
in the Democratic Party
primary election Primary elections, or direct primary are a voting process by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the ...
. Lehrman won the Republican nomination in a primary against attorney
Paul J. Curran Paul Jerome Curran (February 21, 1933 – September 4, 2008) was an American Republican politician who served in the New York State Assembly and fought corruption as a federal prosecutor and as the state's commissioner of investigation. Early ...
after several other Republican candidates dropped out of the race. Political scientists Peter W. Colby and John K. White noted a sharp upstate-downstate split in the race, with Cuomo carrying a 575,000-vote advantage in New York City. "Lehrman carried the rest of the state by 400,000 votes" and won "fifty-two of the fifty-seven upstate counties." The debates between the two gubernatorial candidates were sharp exchanges on issues involving the state's economic and crime problems. Th
public encounters
of Mario M. Cuomo and Lewis E. Lehrman in the closing weeks of the 1982 gubernatorial campaign produced a substantive, often lively, at times intense, but consistently civil exchange of ideas," recalled E. J. Mahon, who covered the race as a journalist. ''The New York Times'' reported after the ''New York Post'' debate at the beginning of October, "Lieut. Gov. Mario M. Cuomo and Lewis E. Lehrman argued virtually uninterrupted for 50 minutes yesterday in their first debate of the New York gubernatorial campaign. What were to have been two-minute opening statements stretched to 25 minutes as the two—intense but seemingly not angry—alternated ripostes and kept their own informal time limits. At one point, Mr. Cuomo gestured to the four panelists and said, 'Maybe we should let them play.'" High national and state unemployment hurt Lehrman's campaign. "The general election campaign for governor was billed as a 'referendum on Reaganomics." However, if the election had been a referendum on Reaganomics and unemployment, Cuomo would have won by a margin reflecting his party's enormous voter-registration edge and allowing room for a few disgruntled Republicans and Independents as well, according to a Princeton University thesis on the gubernatorial campaign. "Instead, Lew Lehrman was able to use technologies such as television and direct mail to campaign 'offensively' on issues which were more favorable for him such as the death penalty, crime,
welfare fraud Welfare, or commonly social welfare, is a type of government support intended to ensure that members of a society can meet basic human needs such as food and shelter. Social security may either be synonymous with welfare, or refer specificall ...
, prayer in schools, and unpopular record of the
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Carey Administration. Moreover, he was able to blunt the Reaganomics issue by widely publicizing an economic plan of his own." Lehrman himself was critical of the national Republican strategy in the election at a time when U.S. unemployment was over 10 percent: "I believe the Reagan Administration should be making a major effort to show clearly how we are going to rebuild the economy and create 20 million jobs in the next 10 years," he told the ''New York Times''. He added: "A slogan like 'Stay the Course' is inadequate." At the time, the size of Lehrman's commercial advertising was virtually unprecedented. The ''Christian Science Monitor'' reported late in the campaign: "The ads have aired so frequently that the New Yorker magazine ran a cartoon showing a parrot next to a television set. The parrot says, 'I'm Lew Lehrman. Lew Lehrman for governor!...' The barrage of television ads have effectively turned Lewis Lehrman into a household term. In his Borough Park, Brooklyn, campaign swing here recently, one youngster shouted, 'There's the man on TV!'" Cuomo sought to make Lehrman's spending a campaign issue. Lehrman "was a clean slate upon which any image could be drawn through television and radio ads," wrote Cuomo in the ''Diaries of Mario M. Cuomo''. "The polls indicated that neither the gold standard nor Reaganomics would enhance the image—the public knew little of the former and New York State was suffering severely from the Reagan Recession and budget cuts—so these issues were ignored. Instead, television ads—four or five million dollars' worth to begin—depicted Lehrman as a genial family man who knew how to produce jobs—his successful business career was proof—and stop crime—with capital punishment." In his diary, Cuomo complained about Lehrman's high spending on direct mail and television advertising, but admitted in late October 1982: "A strange problem has developed. We have more than we can spend—much more!" Cuomo won, and would go on to serve three terms as governor before he was defeated for re-election in 1994.


United States history

In the 1970s he returned to Yale to head up a review of the humanities curriculum for the Yale University Council. For the Gilder Lehrman Collection, Lewis Lehrman and
Richard Gilder Richard Gilder Jr. (May 31, 1932 – May 12, 2020), was an American philanthropist and co-founder of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. He also headed the brokerage firm Gilder, Gagnon, Howe & Co., whose specialty is tradi ...
collected historical documents in order to place them into a collection where they would be available to scholars and the public. First put on deposit at the
Morgan Library The Morgan Library & Museum, formerly the Pierpont Morgan Library, is a museum and research library in the Murray Hill neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It is situated at 225 Madison Avenue, between 36th Street to the south and 37th S ...
, the Gilder Lehrman Collection is now on deposit at the New-York Historical Society. By 2006, the GLC had amassed more than 60,000 documents and other historical items, mostly on 18th and 19th Century America. Articles from those periods have been used in exhibits at George Washington's Mount Vernon, Gettysburg, the Morgan Library and the New-York Historical Society. Lehrman himself has written and lectured about Abraham Lincoln's legacy in the centrality of American history. In 1972, Lehrman founded the Lehrman Institute, a public policy think tank in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
which focused on the study of economic and foreign policy from a historical perspective. Lehrman and investor-philanthropist
Richard Gilder Richard Gilder Jr. (May 31, 1932 – May 12, 2020), was an American philanthropist and co-founder of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. He also headed the brokerage firm Gilder, Gagnon, Howe & Co., whose specialty is tradi ...
, both former students at
Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
and members of Wolf's Head Society, went on to found the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and the Gilder Lehrman Collection of American historical documents in 1994. Lehrman has said that "the building of the collection was to get... documents... out of private hands and into a place where they could be serving American students ndAmerican teachers." They also founded the Lincoln and Soldiers Institute at Gettysburg College, which awards the
Lincoln Prize The Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize, founded by the late Richard Gilder and Lewis Lehrman in partnership with Gabor Boritt, Director Emeritus of the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College, is administered by the Gilder Lehrman Institute for America ...
"annually for the finest scholarly work in English on
Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...
, the
American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...
soldier, or a subject relating to their era", as well as the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition at
Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
, which awards the
Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass (born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, February 1817 or 1818 – February 20, 1895) was an American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, he became ...
Prize for the best work in these fields. "Over the last two generations our public and private schools have been eliminating civics classes and replacing the study of American history with social studies classes," Lehrman said in a newspaper interview. "In many American colleges today you can graduate with a degree without ever taking a full course in American history. I respect the fact that this is a free country... but I do not regard the ignorance of American history as a good thing." In a 2008 interview with ''Humanities'' magazine, Lehrman described the efforts he had begun with Gilder: " want history to be a public thing. Which is why Dick and I, working with Gabor Boritt, established the Lincoln Prize for the very best work on the era of Mr. Lincoln and the Civil War and, with David Davis, the Frederick Douglass Book Prize for the very best work on abolition, resistance, and slavery. We want to help attract the interest of the general public. And scholars and teachers should be honored for the immense effort they make to write and to study and to teach American history." The first prize was "announced on Feb. 12, 1991, the 182d anniversary of Lincoln's birth, with subsequent prizes announced every year on his birthday eve, Feb. 11." The first Lincoln Prize recipient was film-maker Ken Burns for his Civil War series on PBS. Subsequent winners have included historians Michael Burlingame, Richard J. Carwardine, David H. Donald, Eric Foner, John Hope Franklin, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Allen C. Guelzo, James McPherson, James Oakes, and Douglas L. Wilson. Because of their conservative credentials, the support of Lehrman and Gilder for history projects was sometimes controversial. In 2005, David Brion Davis, a self-described "leftish Democrat" who worked with them on the Yale University's Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition defended them: "Despite our major political differences, I have never encountered even the most subtle attempt at ideological influence of any kind with respect to my teaching, writing, cocurating a national exhibition on slavery, or making proposals as a member of the Advisory Board of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History." In 2013, Lehrman published ''The American Founders'', a collection of essays on the military and civilian leaders of the Revolutionary War era. Recently, in 2017 and 2018, Lehrman published ''Churchill, Roosevelt & Company: Studies in Character and Statecraft,'' a book that examines how the special relationship between the United States and Great Britain cemented the alliance that won the war, and ''Lincoln & Churchill: Statesmen at War,'' a discourse about how Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill as commanders in chief led their respective nations to victory.


Abraham Lincoln

Lehrman founded the Lincoln Institute to provide support and assistance to scholars and groups involved in the study of the life of America's 16th President. 'The Lincoln Institute promotes the development and dissemination of printed materials, broadcast products, conferences and Internet resources on Mr. Lincoln. It encourages scholars to cooperate with one another and to contribute to the development of historical materials and the transcription of primary sources for both physical and virtual display. The institute also produces and maintains six websites about Abraham Lincoln and the people with whom he lived and worked. In 2013, Lehrman published ''Lincoln "by littles,"'' a collection of his essays on Lincoln and the Civil War.


Conservative causes

Lehrman is active in civic and conservative causes. He was a member of the Board of Directors of the Project for the New American Century for one year. In the late 1970s he was a Trustee to the American Enterprise Institute and was an early trustee of the Heritage Foundation until the 1990s. He was an early trustee of the Manhattan Institute and a trustee of the Pierpont Morgan Library. In 1983, he helped to found
Citizens for America Citizens for America (CFA) was a United States conservative grass-roots organization founded by President Ronald Reagan's "Kitchen Cabinet" (principally Jaquelin H. Hume, CEO of Basic American Foods of San Francisco, and including Southern Califor ...
, an organization which aided Oliver North's campaign to supply the anti-communist Contra guerrillas in
Nicaragua Nicaragua (; ), officially the Republic of Nicaragua (), is the largest country in Central America, bordered by Honduras to the north, the Caribbean to the east, Costa Rica to the south, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. Managua is the cou ...
. The impetus for the organization came from Jaquelin H. Hume, a friend of President Ronald Reagan, had conceived the project and sold President Reagan on getting Lehrman involved. Reagan called Lehrman: "The President and I had a long talk. The conclusions of our discussion were very simple. We agree we needed a national civil league, an activist enterprise, people who agreed on first principles, that would focus on economic and national security policies. Our first purpose is to induce a mutation in the climate of opinion in American among opinion leaders. We would join the intellectual debate in every town, village, and city through our Congressional district committees." In his diary, Reagan wrote: "Lew Lehrman & Jack Hume came by. They have a great plan for getting our supporters organized at the Cong. District level." At the time, Lehrman was considered a possible future Republican presidential candidate. In 1985, the organization was run for a short time by future lobbyist and convict Jack Abramoff. Abramoff was later fired for mismanaging the organization's funds. During that year, Citizens for America sponsored a meeting in
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between Angolan, Nicaraguan,
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, and Laotian
anti-communist Anti-communism is Political movement, political and Ideology, ideological opposition to communism. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in the Russian Empire, and it reached global dimensions during the Cold War, w ...
rebels. Lehrman personally attended the event, called the "
Democratic International The Democratic International, also known as the Jamboree in Jamba, was a 1985 meeting of anti-Communist rebels held at the headquarters of UNITA in Jamba, Angola.J. Easton, Nina. ''Gang of Five: Leaders at the Center of the Conservative Crusade'', 2 ...
". Lehrman stepped down from Citizens for America in September 1986 and was succeeded by Gerald P. Carmen, former ambassador to Switzerland.


Position on the gold standard

From very early on, Lewis E. Lehrman "became a big fan of Jacques Rueff, Charles de Gaulle's finance minister, and a true believer in the gold standard." Lehrman was a member of the U.S. Gold Commission in 1981 with Congressman
Ron Paul Ronald Ernest Paul (born August 20, 1935) is an American author, activist, physician and retired politician who served as the U.S. representative for Texas's 22nd congressional district from 1976 to 1977 and again from 1979 to 1985, as well ...
. In 1982, they co-authored the book ''The Case for Gold'' with a team of economists that included Murray Rothbard. Lehrman's singular point of view appears in many periodicals including ''The Wall Street Journal'', the ''Washington Post'', ''National Review'', ''American Spectator'' and ''The Weekly Standard''. Additionally, Lehrman contributed t
''Money and the Coming World Order''
originally published by the New York University Press and republished by The Lehrman Institute in 2012, and wrot
''The True Gold Standard''
(2012). In promoting a return to the Gold Standard, Lehrman was allied to James Grant, editor of ''Grant's Interest Rate Observer'', with whom he testified before the United States House Financial Services Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology in March 2011 and September 2012. Lehrman launched the Gold Standard Now in 2011 as an aggregator of monetary policy news and to advocate that "America should lead by unilateral resumption of the gold standard." In 2013, Lehrman published ''Money, Gold and History'', a collection of his writings on monetary policy and his advocacy of the gold standard. One commentator noted that "Lehrman is one of a very small group of contemporary gold advocates able to successfully bridge the gap separating practical conservative intellectualism from fleeting, half-baked idealism." Lehrman repeatedly argued that paper currency was injurious to working Americans. "The primary argument upon which I would rest my case for a gold standard," Lehrman said in a 2013 interview, "is that it preserves the purchasing power, the wages, the salaries, of all those who are unable to defend themselves in the halls of Congress in Washington or elsewhere, in citadels of power like Wall Street."


The Lehrman American Studies Center

In 2005, with Lehrman's funding, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute established the Lehrman American Studies Center. This center, as stated on its website, worked to "enrich higher education by creating the right conditions for vigorous discussion and contemplative scholarship—particularly within the scope of American Studies." The center provided a variety of programming, including an annual two-week summer institute at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
for young academics, and maintained an online library of teaching resources. "I learned at Yale how much can be gained from the close interaction of students with historians," Lehrman noted in a magazine interview. "We have tried to replicate that model at the Lehrman Institute, at the Gilder Lehrman Institute, and most recently with the Lehrman American Studies Center at ISI."


References


External links

*
A Dollar as Good as Gold
, Testimony before the United States House Financial Services Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology, March 17, 2011
Right Web, Profile, Lewis E. Lehrman
''Right Web'', Accessed February 3, 2006.
Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

New-York Historical Society

Prizing History: American Heritage Magazine
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lehrman, Lewis 1938 births Harvard University alumni The Heritage Foundation Living people New York (state) Republicans American bankers National Humanities Medal recipients The Hill School alumni Yale University alumni