CITIZEN SCAIFE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000605820002-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 24, 2010
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: August 1, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
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to California's Pacific Legal Foundation, the oldest and most institutions that receive money from Scaife, like their:
largest of a dozen conservative legal groups, all Scaife ben-J[ TFI)
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eficiaries, which function as mirror-images of the: Nader; ,C0
inspired public interest law groups y_'.
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by KAREN ROTHMYER
Via ive years agog George Mair was bored with his job as The press has generally overlooked Scaife, even when
editorial director of KNX, the CBS radio affiliate in reporting on organizations that are financially dependent on
Los Angeles. As Mair recalls it now, he and John E. him. For example, Scaife is the single largest donor to the..
Cox, Jr., an aide to Republican congressman Barry Mountain States Legal Foundation - $200,000 toward a
Goldwater, Jr., hit on the idea. of starting a nonprofit $1-million budget in 1980- as acknowledged by Mountain
organization aimed primarily at improving relations be- States officials. Yet, earlier this year, when James Watt,
tween business and the media. The one-thing they didn't then-president of Mountain States, was up for Senate
have was money, so when they heard that Richard Larry, an confirmation as Interior Secretary in the Reagan cabinet, the
administrative agent of the Scaife Family Charitable Trusts, press reported - on the basis of available information -
was coming to town, they called up to see if they could talk that Mountain States was primarily funded by timber, util-
to him. ity, and mining interests.
. "The only reason he agreed to have dinner with us is-that Similarly, officials of The Heritage Foundation (see
he thought Jack was another man named Cox he was sup- sidebar, page 44), a conservative think-tank that supplied
posed to be-meeting," Mair, now an editorial columnist for eleven members of the Reagan transition team, acknowl-
the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, says with a laugh. "But edge that Scaife is a far larger contributor than Joseph
he was very polite and listened to our ideas. He came again Coors, whose name has been the only one mentioned in
a few months later and we had lunch. He-gave us a check. most press reports on the group. Scaife, who joined with
When we opened it, it was far, far beyond. our wildest Coors to launch Heritage seven years ago, gave close to
dreams - one hundred thousand dollars." $900,000 -'three times Coors's gift - to help meet the
Thus was born the Foundation for American Communi-i current $5.3-million Heritage budget.
-
cations, one of a large number of organizations that owe l "They're playing all sides of the street: media, politics
ion, in the form of $100 million or so in grants from Scaife
their existence to the generosity of one of the richest men in the soft approach and The hard," says George Mair, refer-
America, Richard Mellon Scaife. Scaife, a great-grandson ring to Scaife and his advisers.. Mair left the Foundation for
of the founder of the Mellon empire, has made the forma- American Communications just over a year ago, forced out,
tion of public opinion both his business and his avocation. he claims, over the issue of what he regarded as the group's
Over the past twelve years, Scaife, whose personal for- increasingly conservative bias. FACS president Jack Cox
tune is conservatively estimated at $150 million, has bought says, "The decision was made by the board of trustees to
or started a variety of publications, mainly in the Pittsburgh sever Mr. Mair's relationship with -the foundation and that
area. But he has increasingly turned his attention from jour- decision was not based on any political or ideological
nalism to other, more ambitious efforts to shape public opin disputes."
charities to conservati ve, particularly New Right, causes.. cane mmsetr nas never puaticty atscussea nts
lion or more to each of nearly a score of organizations that instead with aides like Richard Larry, who has also been
Since 1973 Scaife charitable entities have given $1 mil- charities say they rarely if ever see Scaife himself, but deal
are.closely linked to the New Right movement. These range unavailable for comment. Most of the more sensitive Scaife
from the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, a Massachu- donations are made through a .family trust that is not legally
setts think-tank. that examines political and military issues, required to make any public accounting of its donations, and
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more liberal counterparts, do not volunteer information
about their contributors. The story of Scaife and his activi-
ties has to be pieced together from public records, such
published reports as exist, and conversations with people
who for the most part decline identification - some because
of business or professional reasons, others because they fear
retaliation. (Shortly after this article was completed, the
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published a four-part series on
Scaife. Written by staff writer David Warner, the late-April
series detailed Scaife's publishing and some of his New
Right connections, relying in part on documentation also
privately made available to this reporter.)
Scaife's secretiveness is but one aspect of a complicated
personality. A handsome man in the blond, beefy style one
associates with southwestern ranchers or oil millionaires.,
the forty-eight-year-old Scaife dresses like a Wall Street
Drawing up the agenda
Military and intelligence think-tanks and academic pro-
grams like the National Strategy Information Center have
been particularly favored by Scaife; a catalogue of Scaife
recipients over the past few years would contain virtually
every significant conservative defense-oriented program in
existence in the U.S.
Groups devoted to free-market economics like the
Law and Economics Center at Emory University, which has
provided all-expenses-paid economics courses for 137 fed-
eral judges - have been the second-largest beneficiary
since 1973.
'Because they have been able to attract big names -
people like former Navy Secretary Paul Nitze, now chair-
-:man of policy studies of the Committee on the Present
Danger, and economist Milton Friedman, a frequent lec-
execunve. nrs as[omsmng,y v,ua cyc.N a.c ,,,b ,,,u.-', z.,,,.,,,a turer at the judges' seminars - many Scaife-funded defense
feature. A friend from an early age of J. Edgar Hoover and a and economics organizations command media attention.
lon- time admirer of Barry Goldwater, Scaife is said by fi
This attention has increased with the movement of a number
those who know him to be fascinated by military and intelli- of people from New Right groups into the Reagan adminis-
gence matters. At the same. time, he is so shy and so inse- tration - among them Interior Secretary Watt, from the
cure about his intellectual capacities, according to one busi- Mountain States Legal Foundation, and presidential coun-
ness acquaintance, that "he never speaks business without
two, three, four people around him.".
Scaife's one foray into international publishing represents
perhaps the most curious of his publishing enterprises. In
1973, he became the owner of Kern House Enterprises, a
U.S.-registered company. Kern House ran Forum World
Features, a London-based news agency that supplied feature
material to a large number of papers around the world, in-
cluding at one time about thirty in the U.S. Scaife abruptly
closed down Forum in 1975, shortly before Time Out, a
British weekly, published a purported 1968 CIA memoran-
dum, addressed to then-director Richard Helms, which de-
scribed Forum as a CIA-sponsored operation providing "a
significant means to counter Communist propaganda." The
Forum-CIA tie, which lasted into the seventies, has been
confirmed by various British and American publications
over the years, and. it was confirmed independently by a
source in connection with this article.
Helms is a member of . the same country club near
Pittsburgh as Scaife. `.'Unfortunately," Helms says, "I
really don't know him." On the matter of Forum and a pos-
sible CIA link, he adds, "I don't. know anything about it.
And, if it were true, I wouldn't confirm it.".
Scaife's involvement with Forum began at a time-when
he seems to have begun to recognize that newspapering
might not represent the most effective way to make his mark.
on the world. Perhaps it was frustration at his lack of clout
as a publisher that led Scaife to cast around for other areas in
which to playa public role. This search coincided with the
birth of a powerful new movement, one that was to culmi-
nate in the election of Ronald Reagan - the New Right,
selor Edwin Meese, one of the founders of the Institute for.
Contemporary Studies. Both groups describe Scaife as their
largest donor, and the institute says Scaife provided. its seed
money of $75,000 in 1973.
of just names but numbers count. With so many
conservative groups active in defense and economic
matters, vast quantitites of facts are constantly being
generated and large numbers of seminars and brief-
ings are constantly under way..'.'You can't underes-
timate the effect of a simple paper avalanche," says Leon 1
Reed; the Proxmire aide. "One of the most important things
groups like this can do is to give information to the people in
Groups can also provide people .I
ress who support you
Con
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g
to speak at press conferences, testify before committees,
things like that."
One example of the kind of "paper avalanche" to which
Reed refers is the number of facts and figures generated by
conservative groups at the time of the start of the 1979 con-
gressional debate on the SALT II treaty. A quick check re-.
veals at least eight studies of the issue, all critical, by groups
that receive substantial Scaife backing. In addition, the
Scaife-assisted Georgetown Center for Strategic and Inter-
national Studies held a two-day briefing for twenty key
European journalists on the issue, and The Heritage Founda-
tion held an all-day session for members of the U.S. press.
According to Herb Berkowitz, Heritage director of public
relations, that press briefing "really kicked off the debate."
The arms limitation treaty was not ratified.
Other examples of the potential impact of names and
numbers abound.
^ In its September 17, '1979, issue, Time devoted two
pages to a report on a Brussels conference on NATO spon-
sored by the Georgetown Center and chaired by Henry Kis-
singer, a counselor in residence at the center. The article
gloomily asserted: "The North Atlantic Treaty Organization
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week and was found to be less than robust at age 30..The Russians were bent on nuclear superiority. The conclusions,
general diagnosis: flabby nuclear muscle and a creeping in- which were widely accepted as official, played a major role
feriority complex." in shaping the current defense debate.
D In August 1980, a United Features Syndicate column by The Daedalus project proposed by Pipes was agreed to,
Virginia Payette reported that "Terrorism has become a fact but funding was sought from the Carnegie Endowment for
of American life." The article went on to explain, "It International Peace to provide balance to the Scaife doria-
doesn't have to be that way, according to Dr. Samuel T. tion, and the issue of Pipes's editorship was left unresolved.
Francis, an expert on international terrorism of The Heritage As the essays began to come in, according to one source
Foundation. ... Not if we give the FBI and the CIA a close to the project, it became evident that many were "un-
chance to stop it.... The way things are now, he warns, der the influence of Pipes and the B-team mentality. It be-
the FBI and the police are not only hamstrung by red tape, came clear that this was to be the B-Team's riposte to earlier
they are themselves being hauled into court for violating the liberal critics." Eventually, it was agreed that the project
civil liberties" of known terrorists. I would have a board of advisers but no guest editor.
At some point following that decision, Scaife withdrew
from the agreement to supply additional funds and insisted
that the Scaife name not be associated with the project.
Stephen R. Graubard, Daedalus's editor, says his recollec-
tion is that Scaife aides were unhappy about several things,
especially a time delay in the publication of what turned out
Scaife's funding not only makes possible a critical to be two special issues, Fall and Winter 1980. "They never
scrutiny of television programs; it also helps to create pro- said Pipes had to be guest editor or we'll take our marbles..
grams. Between 1976 and 1977, Scaife entities supplied and go home," Graubard says. Others recall things differ-
$225,000 (the second-largest grant after Mobil),to WGBH, ently. A second source close to the project says, "The
the Boston public broadcasting station, for a series that ex- Scaife people said their understanding was that Pipes was to
amined topics including the CIA, defense, and foreign pol- be the sole guest editor and strongly implied bad faith. They,
previniic vnvernment estimates and an assertion that the .... "_ are heard from at all.. ~ ^
B-team conclusions, delivered in late 1976, included an es- could be an increasing number of one-sided debates in
,;mate of Soviet defense spending that was twice as high. as which the challengers are. far outnumbered, if indeed they -
.been chairman of the so-called B-team, a group of ten out- By multiplying the authorities to whom the media are
Side experts convened by George Bush while Bush was CIA prepared to give a friendly hearing, Scaife has helped to
chief to make an assessment of Soviet military strength. The . create an illusion of diversity where none exists. The result
Pipes was keenly interested in defense policy, having brought into the argument."
backer, in the form of a Scaife charity that was willing to fenseless against a false premise that none or the debaters
put up $25,000 immediately and $25,000 to $50,000 later. has challenged, or a neglected aspect that none of them has
icy. Scaife later supplied $110,000 in pre-production. grants were, in effect, trying to dictate what was to be in the mag
for a series on intelligence issues, based on a script by azine. They wanted to give the cold-war hard line."
former CIA deputy director Ray Cline, now a top official at
the Georgetown Center for Strategic and International n the end, it is difficult to say what lessons, if any, can
Studies. According to Peter McGhee, WGBH program be drawn from the story of Richard Mellon Scaife and
manager for national productions, the series currently is in - his activities. While such a recounting suggests that
limbo because only half of the needed $2 million has been journalists should treat the rich and their creations - the
raised. He says he is unsure how much of that, if any, was foundations, the trusts, the charitable organizations -
pledged by. Scaife. with as much curiosity and skepticism as they treat govern-
Closer to Pittsburgh, Scaife supplied $500,000 to public ment and political groups, the fact is that the size of Scaife's .~..
television station WQLN in Erie, Pennsylvania, to help un- fortune and the narrowness of his interests make him un-
derwrite Free to Choose, a ten-part series featuring Milton usual, if not unique.
Friedman. Beyond this, the fact that Scaife - virtually unnoticed
On the print side, Scaife has helped to underwrite a has been able to establish group after group whose collec-
number of magazines. In the past decade, for example, five effect has been to help shape the way. Americans think
Scaife has given more than $1 million to the publishers of about themselves and their nation's problems raises a con-
The American Spectator, a monthly whose views range cern addressed by Walter Lippmann nearly sixty years ago.
across the conservative spectrum. "On all but a very few matters for short stretches in our
The most prestigious of the periodicals with which Scaife lives, the utmost independence that we can exercise is to
has been associated is Daedalus, the journal of the Ameri- multiply the authorities to whom we give a friendly hear-
can Academy of Arts and Sciences. Three years ago, ing," Lippmann wrote in Public Opinion. "As congenital
Richard Pipes, a Harvard historian who is now a member of amateurs our quest for truth consists in stirring up the ex-
the National Security Council staff, approached Daedalus perts, and forcing them to answer any heresy that has the
with a 'proposal for a special issue on U.S. defense policy, . accent of conviction. In such a debate we can often judge
with himself as guest editor. Pipes also provided a proposed who-has won the dialectical victory, but we are virtually de-
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Where the money goes
Some of the la ger or better-known conservative and New
Right groups to which Richard Scaife has given substantial
funding since 1973 are listed below. Amounts, which in-
elude grants from the Carthage and Sarah Scaife Founda-
tions and the Trust for the Grandchildren of Sarah Mellon
Scaife, are approximate.
Defense
The Center for Strategic and International Studies, $5.3 million
Georgetown University (Washington, D.C.)
.The Committee for a Free World (New York)$50,000
Committee on the Present Danger (Washington, $360,000
D.C.)-
Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, $3.5 million
Stanford University (Stanford, Calif.)
Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis (Cambridge) *t. $1.9 million
National Security Program, New York University t $6 million
and National Strategy Information Center (New
York) t
Economics
Foundation for Research in Economics and Educa- $1.4 million
tion (Westwood, Calif.)
International Center for Economic Policy Studies $150,000
(New York)t
International Institute for Economic Research (West- .$300,000
wood, Calif.)*t
Law and Economics Center, originally at Miami Uni- $3 million
versity, now at Emory University (Atlanta)?t
World Research, Inc. (San Diego)
WQLN-TV (Erie. Pa.), 5500,000
$1 million .
Media
Accuracy in Media (Washington, D.C.) $150,000
Alternative Educational Foundation (The American $900,000
Spectator magazine. Bloomington, Ind.)
The Media Institute (Washington, D.C.)*t $475,000
The Institute for Contemporary Studies (San $1.7 million
Francisco)*t
Think-tanks
The Heritage Foundation (Washington, D.C.)?t $3.8 million
American Legislative Exchange Council
(Washington, D.C.)t
The Free Congress Research and Education $700,000
Foundation, Inc. (Washington, D.C.)t
Legal Groups
Americans for Effective Law. Enforcement (Evanston) $1 million
National Legal Center for the Public Interest, plus six $1.8 million
atmiates (capital Legal Foundation, Washington,
D.C.; Mountain States Legal Foundation, Denver,
Mid-Atlantic Legal Foundation, Philadelphia; Great
Southeastern Legal. Foundation. Atlanta)Ot
or private records andlor confirmation by organization
Pacific Legal Foundation (Sacramento)t
Columbia's School of Journalism.. Research for this. article was
Karen Rothmyer. a former Wall Street Journal reporter. teaches at
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