Anyone who knew Edwin J. Feulner Jr. back when he came to Washington, D.C. as a young congressional staffer in the late 1960s inevitably recalls him discussing his dream: A foundation that would craft conservative philosophy about policy, foreign and domestic, and make it marketable to average people.
When the sad news came on July 18 that Feulner died at age 83, his dream had not only come true but also was alive and thriving.
The Heritage Foundation, now 52 years old and of which Feulner was president from 1977-2013 and again from 2017-18, was providing the right-of-center intellectual firepower for members of Congress and private businesses — not to mention two Republican presidents, Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump, who staffed much of their administration with Heritage associates and alumnus.
As Reagan prepared to negotiate arms control with Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet leader "objected to suggestions from American conservatives, specifically citing the Heritage Foundation, ‘that the United States should use the arms race to ... weaken the Soviet Union.'"
Beginning with its publication "Management for Leadership: Policy Management in a Conservative Administration," the Heritage Foundation worked closely with the Reagan administration on policies ranging from agriculture to reducing federal spending to advising White House counselor Ed Meese on appointing conservatives to the Supreme Court and lower federal courts.
Project 2025 was a Heritage Foundation compendium of ideas old and new cobbled together by alumni of the first Trump administration as an agenda for the next one. Among this agenda were ideas conservatives had spoken of for years but had taken no action upon —including defunding Planned Parenthood and abolishing the Department of Education. Although candidate Trump distanced himself from Project 2025 in the 2024 campaign, its agenda and many of his authors are today integral part of President Trump's second administration.
Not bad, one has to say, for an organization that began its research in relative obscurity, and, as historian Lee Edwards recalled, "with 12 employees, one mimeograph machine and two dogs."
At the time Feulner was preparing to resign as a top aide to conservative Rep. Phil Crane, R.-Ill., to assume the helm of the fledgling Heritage Foundation in 1977, its prospects were not promising. It had been through four presidents since its founding in 1973 and all the money and attention were on foundations of the left.
The Ford Foundation, as Pat Buchanan wrote, "was sitting atop the largest pile of tax-exempt cash of any foundation in America, deploying its vast wealth in social engineering projects so far from the wishes of the man who had funded it with his fortune, Henry Ford, that grandson Henry Ford, II had resigned in disgust from the board. Brookings [Institute] was a D.C. wildlife sanctuary for liberal intellectuals who, feeding on various stipends, churned out papers critical of Nixon policies, while plotting their own and the Democrats' return to power."
All of this changed with a friend of Feulner and fellow conservative congressional staffer, Paul Weyrich, opened a letter to his boss, Sen. Gordon Allott, R-Colo., from beer magnate Joseph Coors. Was there any foundation or institute, Coors inquired, with which he could contribute money? Weyrich and Feulner (who was a trustee of Heritage since its founding in 1973) thereupon got in touch with Coors, offered a business plan for Heritage, and secured a $250,000 check from the "beer baron."
The rest, as the saying goes, is history. Feulner, then 31, was able to quit his job and work full-time for the suddenly invigorated foundation. As president, Feulner delegated much of the administration and policy endeavors to associates (notably longtime Chief Operating Officer Phil Truluck) and went on the road to win over fellow conservatives willing to invest venture capital in the Heritage Foundation. California oilman Henry Salvatori, Michigan entrepreneurs Jay Van Andel and Richard DeVoss, and longtime conservative donor and activist Diana Spencer all weighed in strongly to help Feulner's dream come true.
The son of a Chicago realtor, the young Feulner's conservatism was forged in his pre-conciliar Roman Catholicism (three maternal uncles were priests) and his early Catholic education. After graduation from Regis University and the Wharton School of Finance, he worked for the Center for Strategic Studies (now the Center for Strategic and International Studies), and then joined the staff of Rep. Melvin Laird, R-Wis. He went on to work for Crane and also served as executive director of the House Republican Study Committee, which preceded Heritage in terms of crafting and marketing conservative policy.
Ed later served as president of The Mont Pelerin Society, founded by economists Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman and others. And, recalled Chicago publisher and venerable conservative activist Jameson Campaigne, "he also spent about a month a year in Asia, doing his own 'networking' diplomacy helping good people there with how to get things done the right way. 'People are policy' was Ed's motto."
"Ed was an action intellectual who believed in the power of ideas but understood they would remain powerless unless transformed into relevant policies and programs through marketing and publicity," wrote longtime Heritage scholar Edwards in his memoirs, "He was an astute manager with an MBA from Wharton who believed in leadership by consensus."
And Feulner was an never-give-in optimist, always upbeat and signing off on all of his correspondence with "Onward!"
Ed Feulner is gone. But his legacy clearly lives on and much will be said and written of him in the weeks ahead. Perhaps the most apt epitaph for him is that of the British architect Sir Christopher Wren: "If you seek his monument, look around."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Click Here Now.