Pete of Pioneer

Friday, November 28, 2008



That wasn't Pete Peters, the founder of the Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research, talking.

It was Ed Crane, president and founder of the Cato Institute, talking about Peters.

Lovett C. "Pete" Peters started the Pioneer Institute, a Massachusetts think tank whose backbone is the free market place, 20 years ago when he was 75.

He was honored Nov. 13 on the anniversary of Pioneer at a festive dinner in the spectacular ballroom of the new Mandarin Oriental Hotel on Boylston Street.

Crane was talking about Peters when he made that important distinction about the conservative moment and what is at its core.

Crane and others were eloquent as they described the indomitable Pete, his partner and wife Ruth Stott Peters, and what motivated a former Texas oil executive to emulate Sisyphus, and start rolling a conservative concept up Beacon Hill and other steep Bay State inclines.


Pete and Ruth Peters at the Mandarin Oriental dinner on the Pioneer Institute's 20th anniversary.

"He's a classical liberal," Crane said of Peters. "Keep in mind what the purpose of our movement is all about. I worry sometimes we get distracted by the concept of economic growth."

"What America is all about is liberty," Crane told several hundred people. There's nothing in the constitution that says by the way this clause is going to make the economy grow better."

"Politics and public policy is about man's relationship to the state," said Crane. "People did not come here because they want agricultural subsidies or some kind of day-care centers or whatever. They just wanted to be free. And that is what makes it such a great nation."

"That is something for all of us to keep in mind as we engage in this debate," Crane said. "It is not a debate about economic freedom."

Supply-side economist Jude Wanniski, was "a big-government Democrat," Crane noted. "He realized cutting taxes would increase revenues. I worry we got to a point where a lot of young people thought that's what this is all about. That has been a mistake."

"Pioneer has been very good about something. It has kept its principles straight from the get-go."

Crane quoted Walter Williams: "We're in danger of losing our liberty in this country. I worry if we lose it we're never going to get it back. And worse than that if America loses its sense of the autonomy of the individual, of the right to live your life as you choose, the whole world will lose it."

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Pioneer chairman Bill Tyler said Peters "has always displayed the spirit of an innovator, whether building or changing the popular mindset ... of the role of government in our society."

"I would bet when you said you wanted to open a think tank that explores free-market ideas in of all places Massachusetts, there were quite a few people who raised their eyebrows."

Peters, he said, was guided by that one should "compromise where necessary, but remember always to set a standard to which the wise and the honest may repair."

Edwin Feulner, president of the Heritage Foundation, took the stage to say Peters "knows that it's ideas that ultimately matter."

Back in the days when conservative Barry Goldwater was running for president there were no conservative think tanks, Feulner said.

John Maynard Keynes, "usually our nemesis on so many policy issues," Feulner said, understood this, writing that "the ideas of economics and political philosophers both when right and wrong are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else."

"The difference lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping from old ones," Feulner said.

He cited work Pioneer and Peters have done on welfare reform, education, health care, social security, and retirement policy issues. "What a great force multiplier he has been for the whole conservative movement."

Larry Reed, founder of the Foundation for Economic Education, which Peters has stoutly supported, called him a "movement builder."

Reed recalled Friedrich Hayek and his mentor Ludwig von Mises, saying they "kept the light flickering when the whole world was mad for statism," in the '30s and '40s.

He cited British anti-slavery crusader William Wilberforce and American Patriots and the Scots, who 456 years before the Declaration of Independence were motivated by the idea of freedom.

"It is not for honor or glory or wealth that we fight but for freedom alone, which no good man gives up except with his life."

"Like those heroes, Peter Peters never gives up," said Reed.

Charlie Baker Jr., now chief executive of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, and an early Peters recruit to Pioneer before he went into the administration of Gov. Bill Weld, said referring to Peters as an optimist is an understatement.

"How optimistic do you have to be to decide in 1988, at the height of the Massachusetts Miracle, when Gov. Dukakis is 18 points up in the polls nationally -- he is going to be the next president of the United States -- and Pete Peters decides, 'You know what? I'm going to start a conservative think tank in Massachusetts'?"

State Street Bank chairman emeritus Bill Edgerly, an early Pioneer supporter, former Gov. Mitt Romney, and Boston Herald editorial-page editor Rachelle Cohen also praised Peters.

It was Curate Mark Eames of the Church of the Redeemer in Chestnut Hill, and a friend of Peters, who set a remarkable tone for the night, in one of the most personal and stirring blessings we can recall. One that people of any political persuasion could embrace.


"Heavenly Father, we offer our gratitude for the chance to celebrate together here tonight.

"We thank you for the blessings that you have bestowed upon the Pioneer Institute over these past 20 years, and we offer our appreciation for the work of its founder Pete Peters.

"We give thanks for his thirst for justice and reform, and for his desire to see all our children get the education they deserve. We praise you for the abundant blessings that Pioneer has offered, and is offering, the people of Massachusetts. Continue to guide and govern Pioneer as it explores the future.

"We know that Pioneer cannot do this alone, so may its supporters gathered here tonight be given the strength to do their part to make this commonwealth, and this city, a true beacon of light: a city on a hill where economic opportunity, sound government, a good education, and freedom are available to all....

"May we always remember those who, as yet, have little opportunity or choice. Lord, give us the wisdom to know the work you would have us do, and the grace to carry it out. Amen."

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Jim Stergios, Pioneer's executive director, who has led the organization in growth and influence of the last couple of years, announced that the institute would soon buy a building and have a permanent home near Beacon Hill.

"We will be here for 20 more years," he said. "We will be able to continue this work from a stronger position." And he put the idea of freedom in slightly different terms. "Our mission is about the idea of merit," he said. "We do not believe we should control the destinies of all people."



May everyone have a pleasant and safe Thanksgiving weekend. -- Tom