I receive CATO Institute emails, and this one came across the wire today:
You may have heard about the lawsuit that Charles and David Koch have filed against the Cato Institute, in which they ask a Kansas court to give them majority control of Cato. You may even have heard from Koch spokespeople about the effort.
I want you to know: We believe this effort is a direct threat to the independence, nonpartisanship, and libertarianism of the Cato Institute. Koch control would gravely damage 35 years of hard work by our Board, officers, staff, and donors to build the Cato Institute's brand and reputation and to make Cato, as George Will put it, "the foremost upholder of the idea of liberty in the nation that is the foremost upholder of the idea of liberty." We intend to fight this threat. And we intend to win and to preserve our independence.
Let me note that we at Cato are immensely grateful for the support we received from Charles and David Koch up until a couple of years ago (about 4 percent of our budget in the past decade), and we admire their donations to many other libertarian causes as well. This dispute isn't personal, we're not trying to demonize the Kochs. We just don't think a think tank can retain its credibility if it's perceived to be -- and is -- literally owned by two highly visible individuals with a well-known political agenda and significant corporate interests. This takeover attempt is a threat to Cato, but it's also generating bad publicity for every group that receives Koch funding. That's why we appreciate people who are speaking up and urging a quick end to this takeover effort and a confirmation of Cato's independence.
You can find lots of information about the takeover attempt at www.cato.org/savecatoand at an independent Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/.... Several outside reporters have also covered the issue, including this front-page story in the New York Times and this column by Ezra Kleinin the Washington Post.
The first day the news of the lawsuit broke, Jonathan Adler laid the problem out pretty clearly at the Volokh Conspiracy:
Whatever the merits of the Kochs’ claim, I cannot understand how their actions can, in any way, advance the cause of individual liberty to which they’ve devoted substantial sums and personal efforts over the years. Even assuming their legal claim has merit, a legal victory will permanently injure the Cato Institute’s reputation....Even if one assumes that the Kochs have better ideas for how Cato should direct its resources, know more about how to advance individual liberty, and are correct that the Institute is too “ subject to the personal preferences of individual officers or directors,” any benefit from whatever changes they could make will be outweighed to the permanent damage to Cato’s reputation caused by turning it into a de facto Koch subsidiary. In short, they will have destroyed the Cato Institute to save it.
Don Boudreaux explains the importance of long-term research at independent think tanks. P. J. O'Rourke regrets that "good citizens with honest wealth who’ve put their money where their minds are" are in this case making such a big mistake. And my colleague Gene Healy notes that
It comes down to one simple question:
Would a think tank that could accurately be described as a wholly owned subsidiary of Koch Industries ever be taken seriously in public-policy debates?
Those of us who work at the Cato Institute have invested many decades in creating the scholarship, the reputation, and indeed the beautiful building of the Cato Institute. We don't want to see all those efforts undermined. That's why we're fighting to remain independent. And we appreciate the support we've gotten from so many friends in blog posts, newspaper articles, Facebook posts, and so on. We want a strong libertarian movement, as I know you do, and a strong movement needs strong, independent institutions.
In liberty,
David Boaz
Isn't it wonderful when Republicans try to canibalize their own? This will be fun to watch in the future...