Former President and co-founder of the American conservative think tank Heritage Foundation Edwin Feulner passed away at age 83 on Friday, 18 July.
Edwin J Feulner was born in Chicago, Illinois on 12 August 1941, into a devout Roman Catholic family. His political career started in 1967, at age 26 as a staff member for Congressman Melvin Laird, a Republican from the state of Wisconsin who later became Secretary of Defence under President Nixon.
Feulner, along with his friend Paul Weyrich, founded the Heritage Foundation in 1973. This was at a time when the Republican and Democratic parties had just recently been placed on the conservative-liberal axis, following the 1968 hippie movement; and it was unclear how much the GOP should embrace conservative social values.
In 1977, Feulner became the President of the Heritage Foundation. He served in that post until 2013, an extensive 36 years. He briefly returned to the office for another year, between 2017 and 2018.
Under his leadership, the Heritage Foundation became the most influential think tank on the right in the United States, at times closely working with Republican legislators and even Presidents. They have a big role in recommending appointees to Presidents from the GOP as well.
In January 1981, the Heritage Foundation published Mandate for Leadership, a conservative manifesto for the federal government in the United States, which they shared with then-President-elect Ronald Reagan. It was highly influential in President Reagan’s policy of shrinking the government. Reagan ended up getting reelected in a historic, 49-state landslide in 1984.
The Heritage Foundation has been publishing new editions of Mandate for Leadership every four years, in presidential election years (with the exception of 1992), which they share with the prospective Republican candidates.
In a piece by The New York Times in 2018, Feulner stated that the foundational principles of his organizations are ‘free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional values and a strong national defence’.
In March 2023, the Heritage Foundation and the Budapest-based conservative think tank Danube Institute signed a landmark cooperation agreement.
The official press release by the Heritage Foundation announcing his passing describes Feulner as such:
‘Ed Feulner was more than a leader—he was a visionary, a builder, and a patriot of the highest order. His unwavering love of country and his determination to safeguard the principles that made America the freest, most prosperous nation in human history shaped every fiber of the conservative movement—and still do’.
The cause or place of death has not yet been made public.
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