A Closer Look at the Pioneer Fund: Response to Rushton
![handle is hein.journals/albany66 and id is 1165 raw text is: A CLOSER LOOK AT THE PIONEER FUND: RESPONSE
TO RUSHTON
William H. Tucker*
INTRODUCTION
Recently in the Albany Law Review, Professor Paul Lombardo
described the origins of the Pioneer Fund, noting the Nazi
sympathies of Wickliffe Preston Draper, its founder, and Harry H.
Laughlin, its first president.' My own recent book-The Funding of
Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and the Pioneer Fund-came to
similar conclusions about Pioneer's early history and went on to
document the role played by its key directors in opposing the civil
rights movement on the basis of putatively scientific evidence of
black intellectual inferiority.2 In response, Professor J. Philippe
Rushton, the new president of the fund, denied all these charges as
based solely on the distortion of misleading pieces of evidence very
selectively picked and the use of invective and name-calling.3
Rushton accused me in particular of taking the low road and
characterized my work as propagandistic.4
Before offering my own reply to Rushton, let me first observe that
I am pleased he has decided to air this issue in an academic journal.
Even before reading my book-indeed, even before its publication-
Rushton wrote to the executive editor at the University of Illinois
Press and to the university president, with a copy to Pioneer's
attorney, claiming, on the basis of the description on the Press web
page, that I had defamed Pioneer, and suggesting that the Press
withdraw or amend its advertisement.' This apparent attempt to
*William H. Tucker is a Professor of Psychology at Rutgers University, Camden.
Paul A. Lombardo, The American Breed Nazi Eugenics and the Origins of the Pioneer
Fund, 65 ALB. L. REV. 743 (2002) [hereinafter Lombardo].
2 WILLIAM H. TUCKER, THE FUNDING OF SCIENTIFIC RACISM: WICKLIFFE DRAPER AND THE
PIONEER FUND 67-69 (2002) (detailing the activities of individuals associated with the
Pioneer Fund, including their opposition to desegregation) [hereinafter TUCKER].
3 J. Philippe Rushton, The Pioneer Fund and the Scientific Study of Human Differences, 66
ALB. L. REV. 207, 222-23 (2002).
Id. at 254.
Letter from J. Philippe Rushton, President, The Pioneer Fund, to Judy McCulloh,
1145](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/albany66&div=64&collection=journals&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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A Closer Look at the Pioneer Fund: Response to Rushton
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