The Seduction of Sarah Palin: Eugenics, CNP, and the Pioneer Fund

by Paul & Phillip D. Collins, October 13th, 2008

Left to right: Wickliffe Preston Draper (1891-1972), founder and benefactor of the Pioneer Fund; on the Board of Directors (1937-72). Harry Hamilton Laughlin (1880-1943), Pres. (1927-28) and Dir. (1923-39) of the American Eugenics Society; Superintendent of the Eugenics Record Office in (1910-21) and its Director (1921-40); first president of the Pioneer Fund (1937-41). Frederick Henry Osborn (1890-1981), second president of the Pioneer Fund (1941–1958); Pres. (1946-52) and Dir. (1969-72) of the American Eugenics Society.

No one on America’s political stage today has more motivation to oppose eugenics than Sarah Palin. The Alaskan Governor and Vice-Presidential running mate has learned experientially about the sanctity of life. In April, she gave birth to a baby boy with Down syndrome (Demer, no pagination). When she first learned that the child would be born with the birth defect, Palin chose life in a situation where 90 percent of women have an abortion (no pagination). Lisa Demer has correctly described Palin “as anti-abortion as a politician can be” (no pagination).

It was, therefore, disturbing to learn that Palin had been vetted by a secretive group with connections to the eugenics movement. In a September 1, 2008 article for The Nation, Max Blumenthal reported that the “members of the Council for National Policy are the hidden hand behind McCain’s Palin pick” (no pagination). According to Blumenthal, the Council for National Policy (CNP) met at a hotel in downtown Minneapolis the week of the Democratic National Convention to acquaint themselves with Palin (no pagination). The article also stated that the Palin selection secured McCain the support of the conservative movement and that CNP participant James Dobson “may soon emerge from his bunker in Colorado Springs to endorse McCain, providing the Republican nominee with the backing of the Christian right’s single most influential figure” (no pagination).

For many people on the left, it is hard to swallow the idea that the CNP has ties to the eugenics movement. After all, CNP participants such as James Dobson, Tim LaHaye, and Alan Keyes are considered to be stalwart pro-lifers. George W. Bush even put in an appearance at a secret meeting of the CNP in 2000 promising to nominate only pro-life judges (no pagination). There is a body of evidence, however, that suggests that all the pro-life rhetoric and pro-life participants may be mere window dressing to hide the sinister goal of creating a master race.

Helms and the Pioneer Fund

The CNP connects to the eugenics movement through deceased Senator Jesse Helms. Helms was on the CNP Board of Governors in 1982 and was a member in 1984-1985, 1988, 1996, 1998, and 1999 (“The Council for National Policy: Selected Member Biographies,” no pagination). Throughout his political career, Helms collaborated closely with two other CNP participants: Thomas Ellis and R.E. Carter-Wrenn (no pagination). In the 1980s, the three CNP participants teamed with Harry Weyher and Marion Parrott to form an elaborate, multimillion dollar network of corporations, political action committees, ad hoc groups, and foundations (“Race Science and the Pioneer Fund,” no pagination). According to the Institute for the Study of Academic Racism, the network’s leadership “especially, Harry Weyher, Thomas F. Ellis and Marion A. Parrott are part of an interlocking set of directorates and associates linking the Pioneer Fund to Jesse Helm’s high-tech political machine” (no pagination). In the 1980s, Ellis’ Coalition for Freedom, a component of the Jesse Helms political machine, received grants totaling $195,000 from the Pioneer Fund (Begos, no pagination).

What exactly is the Pioneer Fund? The story of this mysterious private trust fund begins with a reclusive philanthropist named Wickliffe Draper. Draper was born in Massachusetts in 1891 (no pagination). The product of a mixture of old Kentucky and Puritan blood, Draper was convinced that his family tree constituted a superior stock of humanity that should be considered the true Americans (no pagination). In the 1920s, Draper inherited a multimillion-dollar textile fortune (no pagination). After attending the Nazis’ International Congress for the Scientific Investigation of Population Problems in 1935 Berlin, Draper decided to devote a large portion of his fortune to eugenics and race science (no pagination).It would be no exaggeration to say that Draper was drawing his inspiration from mass murderers. Wilhelm Frick, a war criminal convicted during the Nuremberg trials, was the Honorary Chairman at the 1935 meeting that Draper attended in Berlin (no pagination).

In 1937, Draper joined with eugenicists Harry Laughlin and Frederick Osborn to form the Pioneer Fund (no pagination). The Fund helped the crusade for nationwide eugenical regimentation through the distribution of grants (no pagination). In its first year, the Pioneer Fund had in its budget two German films promoting the theme of eugenics. One of those films, entitled The Hereditary Defective, was shown at 28 high schools throughout the United States thanks to the efforts of Harry Laughlin (no pagination). Draper’s money was also used to print a special edition of Earnest Sevier Cox’s “White America” (no pagination). The racist tract was distributed to every member of the 1937 Congress (no pagination).

For Draper, “race betterment” meant disenfranchisement for blacks. One of the white supremacist academics Draper recruited to his cause was segregationist and Chair of Psychology at Colombia University Henry Garrett. Garrett served as a witness supporting segregation in the 1952 Davis v. County School Board (“Race Science and the Pioneer Fund,” no pagination). Davis v. County School Board became part of a much larger, historic case, Brown v. the Board of Education (no pagination). In 1964, the Missippi Sovereignty Commission used $215,000 given to it by Draper in an attempt to prevent the Civil Rights Act from passing (Begos, no pagination). In 1977, North Iowa professor Dr. Ralph Scott used Pioneer Fund money to finance anti-busing, anti-school integration seminars (Lichtenstein, no pagination).

Draper may have even tried to use internal security organs to advance his agenda. According journalist Grace Lichtenstein, Draper supported Representative Francis E. Walter, the chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), throughout the 1950s and 1960s (no pagination). In 1960 HUAC staff director Richard Arens was forced to leave his Congressional job when it was discovered that he was a paid consultant to Draper (no pagination). Draper may have contributed to the corruption of national security politics and the discrediting and dismantling of America’s internal security apparatus. So it is that Paul Wolfowitz, during his time as Deputy Defense Secretary, could have a “discreet romance” with a woman who was born in Tunisia and raised in Saudi Arabia without anyone asking any serious questions about penetration and compromising of internal security (Leiby, no pagination).

Probably the most high profile case involving the Pioneer Fund was the publishing of The Bell Curve in 1994. The controversial best-seller asserted that whites were genetically superior to blacks and that blacks were inclined to have lower IQs (Begos, no pagination). Anglo-American race scientists William Shockley, Hans J. Eysenck, Arthur Jensen, Roger Pearson, Richard Lynn, J. Philippe Rushton, R. Travis Osborne, Linda Gottfredson, Robert A. Gordon, Daniel R. Vining Jr., Michael Levin, and Seymour Itzkopp were all cited in The Bell Curve and were all recipients of Pioneer Fund money (“Race Science and the Pioneer Fund,” no pagination). According to a November 22, 1994 ABC World News Tonight report, the researchers cited The Bell Curve received $3.5 million from the Pioneer Fund (“The Bell Curve and the Pioneer Fund,” no pagination).

One would think that with the passing of Draper, Laughlin, and Weyher, the Pioneer Fund would have begun pursuing nobler endeavors. Unfortunately, old habits seem to die hard. In February 2006, current Pioneer Fund head J. Philippe Rushton spoke at an American Renaissance conference held at the Hyatt Dulles Hotel in Herndon, Virginia (Williams, no pagination). American Renaissance is a white supremacist magazine headed up by Jared Taylor that promotes the “clear conception of the United States as a nation ruled by and for whites” (no pagination). Rushton was surrounded by such notable white supremacists as former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke, racist talk show host Hal Turner, Director of the Holocaust denying Institute for Historical Review Mark Weber, former neo-Nazi National Alliance members David Pringle and National Vanguard’s Kevin Strom, and former Klansman and head of white supremacist website Stormfront.org Don Black (no pagination). Rushton used the occasion to speak about IQ tests proving whites’ supposed genetic superiority over blacks (no pagination).

The Pioneer Fund and the Power Elite

While many might consider the Pioneer Fund merely a fringe organization, it is far from being a collection of disenfranchised, racist misfits. Pioneer Fund principal Harry Laughlin was also the superintendent of the Eugenics Record Office (ERO) (Chaitkin 551). The ERO was established on 80 acres of land and in buildings donated by E.H. Harriman’s widow, Mary A. Harriman (550). The Harrimans were the most powerful family in the Democratic party at one time and their dynasty belongs among the ranks of the power elite. Like most elitists, the Harrimans possessed a fascination with eugenics. Averell Harriman was on the Executive Committee of New Yorks’ American Museum of Natural History. In 1921, Harriman and the rest of the Museum Executive Committee hosted the Second International Eugenics Congress (551). Averell also contributed $1,000 to the conference and his mother and sister were primary hostesses at the conference (551).

The trend was repeated in 1932 when the Third International Eugenics Congress was held at New York’s American Museum of Natural History (552). Once again, the Harrimans financed the conference and Averell’s mother and sister acted as hostesses (552). At the conference, Dr. Ernst Rudin, the man responsible for Nazi Germany’s sterilization program, was recognized with a medal and was elected President of the International Federation of Eugenics Societies (552). There is no small connection between Laughlin, the Harrimans, and the Nazis. When writing the Nazi’s sterilization law entitled “For the Protection of German Blood and German Honor,” Rudin relied heavily on the “Model Sterilization Law” drafted for the ERO by Laughlin (551). Laughlin was attempting to achieve the ERO’s goal of producing “the perfect man” by 1980 through the sterilization of 15 million Americans (551). Among those targeted by Laughlin’s law were “orphans, the homeless, ne’er-do-wells, and tramps” (552). Ironically, Laughlin would later discover that he had epilepsy, a condition his model law identified as a criterion for sterilization (“Harry Laughlin,” no pagination).

George H.W. Bush, the consummate oligarch, gave an audience to recipients of the Pioneer Fund. In 1969, then-chairman of the Republican Task Force on Earth Resources and Population Bush invited Professors William Shockley and Arthur Jensen to appear before the committee and share their views concerning race and eugenics (52). According to the Institute for the Study of Academic Racism, Shockley would go on to “receive an estimated $188,710 from the Pioneer Fund between 1971 and 1978” and Jensen, Shockley’s recruit into race science, received more than a million dollars from the Pioneer Fund over three decades (“Race Science and the Pioneer Fund,” no pagination). For Bush, the growth of the black population was obviously a threat, as is evidenced by the views held by Shockley and Jensen. In the same year that the GOP task force supplied him with a congressional platform, Shockley wrote:

“Our nobly intended welfare programs may be encouraging dysgenics-retrogressive evolution through disproportionate reproduction of the genetically disadvantage… We fear that ‘fatuous beliefs’ in the power of welfare money, unaided by eugenic foresight, may contribute to a decline of human quality for all segments of society.” (Tarpley and Chaitkin 200)

To counter this tide of so-called “retrogressive evolution,” Shockley proposed a “Bonus Sterilization Plan” (Tarpley and Chaitkin 200). Individuals with genetic defects, chronic diseases, or drug and alcohol addiction would be paid for volunteering to be sterilized (200). Chaitkin and Tarpley elaborate:

“If [the government paid] a bonus rate of $1,000 for each point below 100 IQ, $30,000 put in trust for some 70 IQ moron of 20-child potential, it might return $250,000 to taxpayers in reduced cost of mental retardation care,” Shockley said. (200).

True to the Draper tradition, Shockley identified African-Americans as the main target of his mass sterilization plan. Tarpley and Chaitkin share Shockley’s racist views:

“If those blacks with the least amount of Caucasian genes are in fact the most prolific and the least intelligent, the genetic enslavement will be the destiny of their next generation,” he wrote. Looking at the recent past, Shockley said in 1967: “The lesson to be drawn from Nazi history is the value of free speech, not that eugenics is intolerable.” (200)

Why would Bush give Pioneer Fund recipients with radical racist views a platform? Tarpley and Chaitkin provide an accurate explanation:

Oligarchy… subsumes the self-conception of the oligarch as belonging to a special, exalted breed of mankind, one that is superior to the common rule of mankind as a matter of hereditary, genetic superiority. This mentality generally goes together with a fascination for eugenics, race science and just plain racism as a means of building a case that one’s own family tree and racial stock are indeed superior. (9-10)

Conclusion

The majority of conservatives have been duped and Palin is no exception to that rule. If Palin does not want to become involved with the kind of dirty politics and radical agenda that have made most Americans jaded and cynical, she must recognize the CNP for what it really is. Under the CNP’s mask lies an elite combine that is mobilizing unwitting conservatives and grassroots activists behind an elite agenda. Part of that agenda is eugenics.

Sources Cited

• Begos, Kevin. “Benefactor With a Racist Bent.” Winston-Salem Journal
• Blumenthal, Max. “Secretive Right-Wing Group Vetted Palin.” The Nation 1 September 2008
• Chaitkin, Anton. Treason In America. New York: New Benjamin Franklin House, 1985.
• “Council for National Policy: Selected Member Biographies.” Seek God
• Demer, Lisa. “Abortion opponents give Palin high marks.” Anchorage Daily News 7 September 2008
• “Harry H. Laughlin.” Wikipedia 10 July 2008
• Leiby, Richard. “What Will the Neighbors Say? Wolfowitz Romance Stirs Gossip.” Washington Post 22 March 2005
• Lichtenstein, Grace “Fund Backs Controversial Study of ‘Racial Betterment’.” The New York Times 11 December 1977
• “Race Science and the Pioneer Fund.” Institute for the Study of Academic Racism July 1998
• Tarpley, Webster and Anton Chaitkin. George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography. Washington, D.C.: Executive Intelligence Review, 1992.
• “The Bell Curve and the Pioneer Fund.” ABC World News Tonight 22 November 1994
• Williams, David. “BNP leader embraced by top US Nazi.” Searchlight Magazine April 2006

About the Authors

Phillip D. Collins acted as the editor for The Hidden Face of Terrorism and co-authored the book The Ascendancy of the Scientific Dictatorship with his brother Paul Collins. Both books are available at www.amazon.com. Phillip has also written articles for News With Views, Conspiracy Archive, and the Vexilla Regis Journal.

In 1999, Phillip earned an Associate degree of Arts and Science from Clark State Community College. In 2006, he earned a bachelor’s degree with majors in communication studies and liberal studies along with a minor in philosophy from Wright State University.

Phillip worked as a staff writer for a weekly news publication, the Vandalia Drummer, between late 2007 and 2011. During his tenure with the paper, he earned several accolades.

In 2011, he was inducted into the Media Honor Roll by the Ohio School Board Association for his extensive coverage of the Vandalia-Butler School District. That very same year, the Ohio Newspaper Association bestowed an Osman C. Hooper Newspaper Award upon Phillip for Best Photo. In addition, the City of Vandalia officially proclaimed that November 7, 2011 would be known as “Phillip Collins Day.” This honor was bestowed upon Phillip for his tireless coverage of the City and community.

Shortly after bringing his journalism career to a close, Phillip received another Osman C. Hooper Newspaper Award in the category of In-depth Reporting. This award was given to Phillip for his investigative work over the death of U.S. Marine Maria Lauterbach and the resultant Department of Defense reforms concerning sexual assault and rape. The case drew national attention and received TV coverage by major media organs.

Phillip currently works for the Wyoming Department of Corrections, where he earned the distinction of Employee of the Quarter for the third quarter of 2013. Phillip still works as a freelance journalist and is currently collaborating with his brother on a follow-up to The Ascendancy of the Scientific Dictatorship.

Paul David Collins is the author of The Hidden Face of Terrorism and the co-author of The Ascendancy of the Scientific Dictatorship. In 1999, he earned his Associate of Arts and Science degree from Clark State Community College. In 2006, he received his bachelor’s degree with a major in Liberal Studies and a minor in Political Science from Wright State University. He worked as a professional journalist for roughly four years.

From 2008 to 2012, Paul covered local news for several Times Community News publications, including the Enon Messenger, the New Carlisle Sun, the Tipp City Herald, the Kettering/Oakwood Times, the Beavercreek News Current, the Vandalia Drummer, the Springboro Sun, the Englewood Independent, the Fairborn Daily Herald, and the Xenia Daily Gazette.

Paul also wrote for other local papers, including the Enon Eagle, the New Carlisle News, and the Lusk Herald. In addition to his work in the realm of mainstream, Paul has published several articles concerning the topics of deep politics and elite deviancy. Those articles have appeared in Terry Melanson’s online Conspiracy Archive, Paranoia magazine, Vexilla Regis Journal, and Nexus magazine. He currently works as a correctional officer with the Wyoming Department of Corrections.