A Tribute to Patrick E. Haggerty

October 20, 1980

I first met Pat Haggerty on the evening of March 8,
1974. He was the principal speaker at a dinner that the
IBM Corporation and Frank Cary held in honor of the 1973
Nobel Prize laureates in physics. I had of course known
Mr. Haggerty's name as the CEO of one of the nation's
great technological industries. I was impressed to hear,
in his remarks, the depth of his concern for intellectual
adventure in America, for the responsibility of the private
corporate sector for nurturing the creative spark in Ameri-
can life, and the essentiality of firmer support for the
entire spectrum of scientific investigation as the bedrock
of economic and technological advance. I had a brief cor-
respondence with him at that time, most of which was answered
by his book "The Productive Society" the Benjamin Parliss
Memorial Lectures for 1973. In these writings he articu-
lated a political and social philosophy that of course em-
braced the deepest concern for individual initiative within
the free enterprise system, I say of course insofar as Texas
Instruments has been one of the most successful manifesta-
tions of the application of these principles in an industrial
economy.

Pat Haaqgerty also wrote that
In spite of the dangers (amd-they-arereat-asthese examples
Tthertioa tZovernment intervention in the mixed economy
wit-eventuatty tead to-overeentratism-and-tinaty-beconre-the
load to sertdeme, | see no alternative to a strong role for:
government in today’s world. The real dilemma faced by men
everywhere in world society is that their needs are so great that
they really have no choice except to opt for modes of organi-
zation of society that assure high productivity. Further, while an
organization of society that encroaches on personal freedom
will be tolerated, one that cannot provide an adequate and
tnereasingly higher level of material existence, adequate edu-
cation, good health, and long life will not be tolerated if it is
perceived as such. ChemrtOa Curntey rat a)
To the extent that the warnings with which | began these
discussions alert us to the ways in which a blind and unthinking
pursuit of growth can be counter-productive and depress our
quality of life, they are useful. But when such critics see the only
route to the alleviation of these pressures as the abandonment
of growth, their recommendations become counter-productive
and simply will not have a significant influence on the choices of
the great masses of population of the world.
Additionally, there is the very real danger that the emotional
appeal of these criticisms will result in irrational extensions of
_ centralized government, introduce unnecessary restrictions on
' individual and local freedom, and finally so enlarge the regime
of regulation with one regulation leading to another and
' another as to thrust us all unwittingly into Soizhenitsyn’s ‘‘to-
morrow of mankind.”
| don’t believe it has to happen if we choose wisely enough
from among the variety of routes that a strony role for govern-

ment can follow.
In that last remark Pat Haggerty was articulating two
of the strongest and by no means contradictory elements of
his character: an unswerving consistency of principle, and
a realistic appraisal and readiness for pragmatic compromise
with the actuality of the world as he found it.

After I assumed my present role at The Rockefeller Uni-
versity I of course entered into a much closer relationship
with Pat Haggerty. At first I found him sometimes a forbid-
ding character. His demands for establishing a strategic
overview in the planning of the future of an institution were
congruent with my own but he would often ask questions with a
depth and vehemence that might make one apprehensive -- that
is until I began to realize that he had an intellectual style
not so far unlike my own, one in which every question was ad-
missible but where actions followed more cautiously and
thoughtfully. It is hard to imagine two people who by back-
ground of culture, geography, education or profession could
have been more disparate than Pat Haggerty and myself. As
time went on I came to realize that we were in fact bound by
a commonality of responsibility and goal that went far beyond
those disparate roots. I often wondered how it came to be
that he and I were the only members of the Board to be so be-
mused as to sport a beard long after Julius Caesar's canonical
age of 49,

I do not know how successful Pat Haggerty was, in convey-
ing to a community with which he had too little opportunity
for personal interaction, the depth of his feeling for in-
dividual aspiration, careers, domestic life, the problems that
the disaminities of urban life would add to all of the general
trials and tribulations of an academic career today. For my
own part I will miss all those relentiess probings and ques-
tions, the consistency of institutional purpose and the deeper
integrity, if not superficial warmth, of his personal relation-
ships. The Rockefeller University profited greatly from his
stern guidance during a period of deep threat and troubles.

He was not always part of the time hallowed traditions of
academic cloister, privileges that we must sometimes recall
we are obliged to earn as well as to enjoy; but we are all
here deeply in his debt, and can proceed the more confidently
to a challenging future, for the imprint he has left upon us.