It is a great honor to have been asked by the trustees to assume the presidency of the American Enterprise Institute. I accept with pleasure and high hopes for AEI’s future.

AEI is in a difficult period of transition—one that is quite common, however, in ventures as successful as AEI has been. An organization comes to prominence through the vision and spirit of an individual entrepreneur and then, when the entrepreneur is gone, faces the dilemma of what it will be in the future. Some fail and disappear from the scene. Many maintain themselves by becoming something other than what they had been. Others succeed by rededicating themselves to their founding vision. William Baroody, Sr., was a man of such singular qualities, whose life’s efforts were crowned by such success, that it should not be surprising or discouraging that his passing was followed by a period of great uncertainty.

I am confident AEI will not only succeed but do so in a way Bill Baroody would approve. American government and politics need the American Enterprise Institute, and so does American business. Ideas have consequences, but there is no principle that says the best ideas are the most consequential; and without them government risks becoming nothing but a scramble for resources. To attempt disinterestedly to study and understand the issues facing our country, to be engaged in policy debate without being preoccupied with the headlines of the moment, to offer blunt criticism without losing sight of the great virtues of our political system—these services are not in urgent day-to-day demand in Washington; yet Washington cannot survive without them.

So the supply side is alive and well at AEI, at least insofar as the marketplace of ideas is concerned. And AEI is well endowed to supply this market. It enjoys the good will and loyal support of many prominent individuals, corporations, and private foundations. It is the home of several of our nation’s most gifted and productive scholars. It has a distinguished alumni serving in the senior ranks of all departments of the federal government. It has a longstanding affinity with certain essential presuppositions of serious political thought (the worthiness of a liberal economic order, resolute foreign policy, and tradition-proven cultural values) whose modern resurgence is just beginning. It has earned a reputation for intellectual quality and integrity no partisan can ignore.

We live in a time when everyone seems to think everyone else is infatuated with the short run. Government officials say this about business executives; business executives say it about politicians; the older generation says it about the younger; almost everybody now says it about Keynes. At least we can take solace that we all seem to recognize how dependent we are on each other’s acting with a view toward the long run—that, despite all our riches, we have not lost sight of the primacy of investment over consumption. AEI’s specialty is to advance the long-run view in a short-run city—in defense and foreign policy, in economic and social policy, in the preservation of our political institutions—and we are in it for the long run.

*These remarks were delivered at the tenth annual Public Policy Dinner in Washington, D.C., on December 4, 1986. Mr. DeMuth was elected president by AEI’s Board of Trustees earlier in the day.