@franebleu @photoncollector

It depends how you mean it. There were lots of groups populated by members of the elite to advocate for particular reactionary causes that might overlap, to a greater or lesser extent, with the Heritage Foundation's goals.

Maybe most notable was the America First Committee (actually only founded in Sept. 1940, but close enough). It was different from the Heritage Foundation in that it brought together a really disparate coalition, but it did represent a pretty fashy outlook (which is why their primary goal was to keep the US out of WWII) and basically sought to convince people that what happens in Germany stays in Germany.

The second wave of the KKK was already fading by 1939, but still fairly potent in some areas. It was different from HF in that it was kind of a social club with a right-wing, racist "activist" element. But it was also a political machine that was successful in locking down public office in a lot of places, particularly throughout Indiana and in pockets in other states.

The American Eugenics Society was going full steam ahead throughout the 1930s. I think a lot of HF people would push back at being associated with eugenics, but it's worth keeping in mind that the ideology of the AES and its members tended to be extremely elitist, anti-immigrant, and white supremacist; the whole point of eugenics was to "preserve" and "improve" a kind of idealized northern European racial "type". And given the HF's combination of elitism and xenophobia with a desire to control other people's reproduction, there's at least a whiff of a similarity. Also, see the next paragraph...

It's also worth noting that Heritage isn't the only think tank in the elite right-wing orbit. Probably the most notorious right now is the Claremont Institute, which does, in fact, advocate for eugenics (they claim they don't because they don't use that term, but in practice, they're all for it); last year, the HF gave Claremont its "Heritage Innovation Prize", which comes with $100k.

The Center for Renewing America is another. It is run by its founder and president Russ Vought, who is now the director of the Office of Management and Budget under Trump, and he was a driving force behind HF's Project 2025 document.

Anyways, there are lots of echoes from the 1930s today. Not exactly the same, but clearly there are historical and ideological linkages that are worth exploring.

#fascism #HeritageFoundation #ClaremontInstitute #RussVought #eugenics #xenophobia #racism #KKK #AmericaFirst