Martin Anderson, the economist and adviser to Republican presidents, Ronald Reagan foremost among them, died this past week. The Scrapbook remembered with a pang being hosted by him one pleasant afternoon more than a decade ago at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where he was for many years a senior fellow and adornment to that institution.
Anderson will probably be remembered primarily for his part in formulating President Richard Nixon’s end of the military draft and for his key role in shaping economic policy during Reagan’s critical first year as president. In the latter capacity, he helped smooth relations between the new president and the chairman of the Federal Reserve, who had been appointed by Reagan’s predecessor. Steven F. Hayward tells an amusing story about the beginning of that relationship in his Age of Reagan:
Reagan had his first meeting with [Chairman Paul] Volcker over lunch on his third day in the Oval Office. Reagan opened the lunch with a question that must have nearly knocked Volcker out of his chair: Why do we need a Federal Reserve anyway? Martin Anderson, who had prepared a memorandum for Reagan briefing him for the meeting, recalls Reagan’s words as follows: “I was wondering if you could help me with a question that’s often put to me. I’ve had several letters from people who raise the question of why we need a Federal Reserve at all. They seem to feel that it is the Fed that causes much of our monetary problems and that we would be better off if we abolished it. Why do we need the Federal Reserve?” Had Volcker been chewing on one of his trademark cigars, Anderson thought, he would have swallowed it.
In his later years, Anderson was a tireless chronicler of the Reagan era, in books and monographs. Reagan in His Own Hand, edited with his wife Annelise Anderson and with Kiron Skinner, is a particular favorite of The Scrapbook’s—a collection of the radio addresses, many of them handwritten on legal pads by Reagan, from the years leading up to his successful bid for the White House. We’ve passed many pleasant hours browsing its pages and commend it to readers along with its companion CD, Reagan in His Own Voice.
