Knowledge Must Be the Underpinning of Power

Princeton University/May 11, 1966

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While learning has long been the ally of democracy, the intellectual has not always been the partner of government. As recently as the early years of this century the scholar stood outside the pale of policy, with government usually indifferent to him.

That, I am glad to say, has changed. The intellectual today is very much an inside man. Since the 1930’s our Government has put into effect major policies which men of learning have helped to fashion. More recently, the 89th Congress passed bill after bill, measure after measure, suggested by scholars from all over the country whom I had placed on task forces that were appointed in 1964. In almost every field of governmental concern, from economics to national security, the academic community has become a central instrument of public policy in these United States.

This affluence of power for an intellectual community that once walked on the barren fringes of authority has not been won without some pain. An uneasy conscience is the price any concerned man pays, whether politician or professor, for a share of power in this nuclear age.

More than one scholar, thus, has learned how deeply frustrating it is to try to bring purist approaches to a highly impure problem.

They have come to recognize how imperfect are the realities which must be wrestled with in this most complicated world.

They have learned that criticism is one thing and that diplomacy is another.

They have learned to fear dogmatism in the classroom as well as in the Capital—and to reject the notion that expertise acquired in a lifetime of study in one discipline brings expertise in all other subjects as well.

They have learned, too, that strident emotionalism in the pursuit of truth, no matter how disguised in the language of wisdom, is harmful to public policy—just as harmful as self-righteousness in the application of power. For as Macaulay said: “The proof of virtue”—and, we might add, of wisdom—“is to possess boundless power without abusing it.”

The responsible intellectual who moves between his campus and Washington knows, above all, that his task is, in the language of the current generation, to “cool it”——to bring what my generation called “not heat but light” to public affairs.

So today we dedicate this building not only to the man, but to his faith that knowledge must be the underpinning of power—and that the public life is a calling that is worthy of the scholar as well as the politician.

There was once a time when knowledge seemed less essential to the process of government. Andrew Jackson held the opinion that the duties of all public offices were “so plain and simple” that any man of average intelligence could perform them.