“Scholarship for the sake of the scholar is refined selfishness. Scholarship for the sake of the state and the people is refined patriotism.“

Thomas Chamberlain.              

U. of Wisc. President (1890)

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I came to the state of Wisconsin mostly be chance. I trained here for my Peace Corps service in the mid 1960s. I then returned after two years in India mostly because I had little direction in life and rather liked the ubiquitous cows found there. Upon getting a master’s degree in Urban Studies (who knew what that meant), I literally stumbled into my my first professional job. Truly, my career was largely (completely) accidental. This was fortuitous since I had no observable skills, none at all.

Serendipity and circumstances found me showing up for a civil service interview in Madison for a position I knew absolutely nothing about. Upon beginning the interrogation by a three- person panel, I first discovered the job was for a research analyst- social services. This was not good.

I knew very little about formal research at the time and less about our social services system. I mused to myself in the moment … this should be mercifully short. But it wasn’t, you cannot discount bad choices made by otherwise smart people. Another way of saying this is milabili disputandem est or there is no accounting for taste.

I somehow made the final slot of the three names submitted to the actual hiring supervisor. Upon selecting me, she noted that the second ranked candidate was better than the first and I was better than the second. My response to her was ‘good thing you were not permitted to see the next candidate on the list. They must have been dynamite. ‘

So, in 1971, I started my shaky (in my estimation) professional life as a civil servant working on public welfare issues for the State of Wisconsin. Back then, civil servants in that state were well respected. We took pride at being at the cutting edge of public service design and management. Among many other things, I was one of the ‘young turks’ that pushed and prodded state social service administration into the computer age.

Then, another serendipitous moment occurred. My boss told me to work with a University of Wisconsin professor (Irving Piliavin) who needed state help and approval for a research proposal he was submitting for federal funding. When finished, I forgot all about this routine task until the prof called one day to let me know he had gotten his funding.

Next came the shock! He wanted me to take that long one-mile journey down State Street from government service to the strange world of the academy at the University of Wisconsin. As I have always done on the big decisions in my life, I thought on the matter for five, maybe six, seconds before saying ‘sure, why not.’

What started out as a two-year temporary position to run the day to day operations of this complex study of welfare administration turned into a career as a policy wonk and sometimes scholar. Better yet, I soon found myself at the center of the national storm as welfare reform emerged to take the front burner on the national policy agenda. As one of President Carter’s cabinet members (Joseph Califano) noted at the time, welfare reform had become the Mideast of domestic policy.

The welfare issue was the core firestorm policy question where reason and civility went to die. The topic embraced all forms of value laden disputes involving sex, family, work, culture, government over reach, and personal responsibility. The topic proved so contentious that I oft mused the following: ‘I am only confident that I’m approaching the truth when no one else agrees with me.”

Still, I rather loved it. More than that. I cannot imagine many other careers that would have captured my restless mind so fully and with such completeness. After all, I stayed at the University, mostly the Institute for Research on Poverty which I helped manage in the decade or so before I finally retired. That’s evidence that I must have enjoyed it all. I also taught a variety of policy courses in the school of Social Work. All that, plus endless rounds of talks and consultation work around the country had me juggling mind (and body) crushing work schedules on way too many occasions. But that doesn’t mean all that much when you are having fun.

Fortunately, it turned out to be a rather perfect situation for me, especially after I finally managed to secure my doctorate (the union card for any university position). I was associated with the premier academic-based research entity in the country. Everyone doing this work knew of IRP. This gave me instant legitimacy. At the same time, I kept myself distant from the more suffocating aspects of the formal academic culture, which I generally found overly narrow and provincial. Despite that, I still concluded that the academy was the perfect place to pursue my craft. As long as I could raise my own money, I could take on any topic or issue I wanted, a freedom not found in hierarchical agencies. And, I found myself surrounded by the best and the brightest, both in the academy and among the public officials with whom I worked. It was paradise.

More to the point, I became aware of what has long been called The Wisconsin Idea. This ‘Wisconsin Idea’ is the iconic standard for a special, perhaps unique, state- university partnership that one wag in the 1930s summarized as ‘the boundaries of the university are the boundaries of the State.’

Theodore Roosevelt, as he agreed to run for President once again in 1912, observed that ‘the University of Wisconsin (UW) has been more influential than any other agency in making Wisconsin what it has become, a laboratory for wise social and industrial experiments in the betterment of conditions.’ Somewhere around the beginning if the 20th century, the UW broke out if its scholarly cultural isolation to become a partner in the management of public affairs.

Many figures played a role in the development of this concept. Perhaps the two most central were Robert M. Lafollete, known as fighting Bob, and Charles Van Hise. They were friends and classmates who graduated from the UW in 1879. They remained close as they went in different career directions. Bob went on to be a nationally renowned progressive Republican who served as Wisconsin Governor and then U.S. Senator, beginning his first term as governor in 1900.

As the story goes, Bob became ‘fighting‘ Bob when he was offered a bribe to influence the outcome of a court case in 1891. Enraged, he began his lifelong mission to ween politics from the control of the powerful interests, especially a few lumber and railroad magnates. As governor, with support from his long time college friend (Van Hise), he began to professionalize the making of policy.

Charles Van Hise, on the other hand, pursued a distinguished academic career, assuming the leadership of UW in 1903. He used that position both to recruit civic minded scholars and to encourage their collaboration with government. Together, Charles and ‘fighting’ Bob were positioned to form a close, collaborative relationship between the state and the university.

For example, Charles McCarthy took leave from the University to create the first legislative reference bureau in the nation. Until then, bills typically were drafted by select corporate lawyers whose objectivity, as you might surmise, was highly suspect. This first expression of the Wisconsin idea witnessed the crafting of several ground breaking laws and initiatives including a number of improvements to the Civil Service system, workers compensation, and the initiative and the referendum reforms. The 1911 state legislative session yet is considered one of the more progressive in memory.

One early name, however, stands out on the academic side of the ledger. It is John R. Commons. UW President Van Hise recruited him to the faculty knowing that he would be less a natural scholar and more of an applied thinker … someone who valued making contributions to the society at large. Critically, Commons rejected the standard neoclassical assumptions prevalent in that era which dictated that markets should be left alone. He was very aware of market failures and their costs to broader society. More to the point, he set out to do something about those failures. And he did, all through the early 20th century era of progressive activities.

At the same time, Fighting Bob had two offspring that carried on his mission to sustain the drift of the state’s Republican Party (no effective Democratic alternative would emerge until the 1950s) into a force for progressive ideals.

It is difficilt to believe now, but the GOP back then was a big tent. It embraced both a conservative wing (the Stalwarts) and a radical progressive element that today might be labeled as Democratic Socialists. In recent years, that same party has attacked the UW, with former governor Scott Walker even calling into question the validity of the Wisconsin Idea.

It was different back then. The 1910 Wisconsin Republican platform contained the following: We are proud of the high eminence attained by our state university… We commend its research work … We regard the University as the people’s servant, carrying knowledge and assistance to the homes and farms and work places.“

That larger perspective would continue. One son of ‘fighting’ Bob, Robert La Follete Jr, succeeded his father to the Senate in 1925. Junior’s younger sibling, Phillip, was elected to the Governor’s seat. Both were ideally situated to act proactively as the great global depression which brought the state’s, the nation’s, and the world’s economy to its knees.

In the early 1930s, the young Lafollettes began working on the foundations for what would later become signature elements of FDR’s New Deal. Senator Robert La Follette’s bill to create an annual national economic plan became the template for the 1933 National Industrial Recovery Act.  Wisconsin’s unemployment compensation law, signed by Governor Phil La Follette, paved the way for a similar provision to become part of the 1935 Social Security Act.

At the center of drafting and administering each of these New Deal measures were thirty or so former students of economist John R. Commons, long time advisor to the La Follette family. Wisconsin was both anticipating the coming nation’s needs and developing skilled personnel to effectively respond.

And therein lies the secret to the longevity of the Wisconsin Idea. The seeds of one generation flowered in the next. One of John Commons more distinguished students was Edwin Witte. An academic economist, his first public service effort was to head the state legislative reference bureau from 1922 to 1933. At that critical moment, he was summoned to our nations Capital by FDR to be naned the Executive Director of the President’s Committee on Economic Security. When expertise and experience were needed, FDR went to the state known to possess such gifts.

Ed brought some bright young students with him (Wilbur Cohen was one who was still a D.C. fixture when I started my career in the early 1970s). However, the Committee as a whole brought together people representing a variety of perspectives and interests. Thus, it proved dysfunctional, conflicting over diverse values and politics.

In the end, Witte worked 18 hours days almost single handedly doing all the actuarial analysis as he crafted the center piece of the New Deal … the Social Security Act. The bill, developed in about six months, went well beyond providing help to seniors. It created a brand new relationship between the federal government and the American people. Not surprisingly, Witte long has been considered the ‘father of social security.‘

His Herculean efforts took a personal toll as he suffered a heart attack at the end from which he barely survived. Still, he returned to the University of Wisconsin where he mentored a new generation of economists. One of them was Robert Lampman, who grew up on a farm in the north part of the state. After obtaining his doctorate in economics, Bob remained on the faculty in Madison, something rarely done in academia.

I was fortunate to know Bob personally. He was one of the most humble and kind humans I’ve run across in my life, especially for an acclaimed economist. They can be a prickly lot. Anyway, In the same spirit of public service as his mentor (Witte), he served on President Kennedy’s National Council of Economic Advisors. One task of the Council is to prepare an annual report to the President on the state of the economy.

In the final report to Kennedy before his untimely assassination, Bob largely prepared a chapter on poverty that was to have an enormous impact on subsequent public policy. At the time, a concensus had developed which asserted that a rising economic tide would lift all boats. If true, government need do little more. Bob argued that several structural pockets of poverty would remain in spite of continued economic growth. In his view, there would remain a seminal role for targeted public interventions.

In a fashion, Bob Lampman would become the intellectual ‘father of the War on Poverty.’ When President Johnson began focusing his larger than life energies on A Great Society, he and others in his administration picked up on Bob’s analysis of the issue.

As Bob had intimidated in his analysis, targeted public initiatives were needed. Soon, a host of such  programs from Head Start to Model Cities were created. They both supplemented and complemented macro economic measures designed to improve overall economic performance by attacking more directly those stubborn structural problems that Bob suggested might persist.

The planners in Washington soon realized they needed an academic partner, much like the La Follettes realized that they needed John Commons and his UW colleagues during the progressive era. After all, you cannot wage a war absent good intelligence. So, the generals of the War on Poverty approached Bob and the University of Wisconsin to establish a research entity that would rigorously look at the causes and cures of poverty.  This became the Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP) into which I stumbled a decade after its founding.

IRP has its own story line which I cannot go into here. But after some six decades, the Institute remains alive and well despite occasional (though serious) political threats and the vagaries that surround any federally supported entity. It certainly was the perfect home for a renegade academic and policy wonk like myself. 

In fact, my professional memoir is titled A Wayward Academic: Reflections from the policy trenches. Perhaps like John R. Commons of a much earlier period, my heart was in translating the best thought into action. I saw myself as the bridge between theory and action. (NOTE: my more masochistic readers might want to look at my co-authored work: Evidence- Based Policymaking: Envisioning a new era of theory, research, and practice.) That work exemplifies the bridge dimension of my professional endeavors.

Like Commons and Witte before me, I did teach (or try to) another generation of policy wonks, but within the Social Work (not the economics) tradition. And I did my share of research though, by inherent disposition, I seldom worked toward publishing in peer reviewed scholarly journals. I preferred reaching out to policy practioners and hands-on academics. Some of my pieces in FOCUS, the widely distributed IRP publication, had extraordinary impacts among policy aficionados.

At heart, though, I sense I was much like John Commons, Ed Witte, and Robert Lampman (who greatly encouraged me in my early years at UW). Simply addressing the interests of remote scholars held little charm for me. Functioning in the real world, with all its bizarre frustrations is what kept me stimulated and motivated. I wanted to make a difference.

When I retired, I recall telling the audience at my fairwell gathering the following: I enjoyed the most remarkable career possible. Essentially, I flew around the country to work with some of the best and the brightest on some of the most intractable social issues imaginable. And they actually paid me to do this. Freaking amazing!”

I cannot begin to comment on my long, complex, and sometimes agonizing journey through the policy labyrinth of reform back when poverty and welfare were hot button issues. There were many memorable moments such as the time Republican Wisconsin Governor and Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson attacked me in a public forum in Chicago. I mention that single moment since the early advocates of the Wisconsin Idea largely were Republicans of the progressive stripe. The world has surely keeps changing since Tommy, a conservative in my era, would be labeled a leftist, if not a Communist, by today’s GOP  standards.

But most of my memories are so positive … working in the Clinton administration on his welfare package, working on how human services might be reworked and reconceptualized to be more coherent and effective, then establishing models that both enhanced communication and collaboration among states seeking innovative solutions to old problems, and reestablishing a working connection between the state and university on a variety of welfare and human services initiatives (the state- university relationship on social policy matters had fallen into a rather moribund state until I arrived at IRP). This is just a sampling of topics I engaged during my years spent in what I have oft referred to as my policy candy store.

I recall appearing before a Congressional hearing on one of Wisconsin’s signature reform ideas in the 1980s. When the Committee chair (then iconic welfare expert Senator Patrick Moynihan) realized I was from IRP, he stated publicly that the Institute was the best thing to come out of President Johnson’s War on Poverty.

That’s nonsense, of course. Still, I felt so fortunate to have literally fallen into a career there. I always felt that I was walking in the footsteps of policy icons from the past. I suspect that many of my colleagues (Irv Garfinkle, Sheldon Danziger, Robert Haveman, Barbara Wolfe, etc.) felt a similar tug in some ways.

Perhaps I even helped nurture and sustain that tradition known as the Wisconsin Idea. I know I tried, at least in some small measure.

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“But the Wisconsin tradition (idea) meant more than a simple belief in people. It also meant a faith in the application of intelligence and reason to the problems of society. It meant a deep conviction that the role of government was not to stmble along like a drunkard in the dark, but to light its way by the best torches of knowledge and understanding it could find.”

Adelaide Stevenson … twice Democratic candidate for the Presidency.