Collection Guide
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Guide to the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions Collection, 1950-1991 [Bulk Dates 1961-1987]
Mss 18
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Table of contents
Description
The Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions Collection, 1950-1991, contains 710 linear feet of material, including
paper records, microfilm, photographs, audiotapes, films, videotapes, artwork, and artifacts. The paper records, photographs
and microfilm have been processed, with partial funding by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission. The
audiovisual materials, artwork, and artifacts are largely unprocessed.
Background
The Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions grew out of the 'Basic Issues' program of the Fund for the Republic. The
Fund emerged from a desire to combat the rampant abuses of American civil liberties that characterized the McCarthy era. With
a fifteen million dollar grant from the Ford Foundation, the Fund set in 1954 to provide support to church, educational, and
social service organizations in their efforts to protect the rights enumerated in the first ten Amendments to the Constitution.The Center consists of twenty-five men who meet every day in a Spanish style building known to the members as El Parthenon.
The men, one of whom is a woman, are writers, philosophers, scientists, social scientists, and lawyers, with two bishops and
two ex-college presidents thrown in... It is not a think tank hired to do the planning that public agencies or private businesses
cannot or will not do for themselves. Neither is it a refuge for scholars who want to get away from it all and do their research
and write their books. It is an organized group, rather than a collection of individuals. It is an organization of men who
are free of any obligation except to join in an effort to understand the subjects they have selected for study. It is a community.
And, since its members are trying to think together, it may be called, at least in potentiality, an intellectual community.
Restrictions
Publication Rights
Copyright has not been assigned to the Department of Special Collections, UCSB.
All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Head of Special Collections.
Permission for publication is given on behalf of the Department of Special Collections as the owner of the physical items
and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which also must be obtained.
Availability
Restrictions
PARTS OF COLLECTION STORED OFF-SITE. Advance notice required for access.