Episode 30: History of Philanthropy

Welcome to another edition of “Around with Randall”. Your weekly podcast on making your nonprofit more effective for your community. And here is your host, the CEO and founder of Hallett Philanthropy, Randall Hallett. 

Thank you again for joining me on another edition of, “Around with Randall,” today a little bit different view of the podcast. I had a client here recently, while doing some board work, one of the board members asked about the history of philanthropy. I talk about this quite often, but I thought I would expound a little bit today, with maybe a little less tactical at the end. For those of us in the nonprofit world, it's probably important to realize how we got to this point in terms of what we do and why we do it. 

If we want to understand the beginnings of the thought and even the word philanthropy, we have to go back to the ancient Greeks nearly 2,500 years ago, and really we're going to talk about Prometheus.  Zeus, for those who didn't follow Greek mythology, the God of Gods, so to speak, was disappointed in human beings. He believed them to be blind with no sense of direction and not valued very much. He was going to destroy them.  Prometheus, a Titan, (we will not spend a great deal of time talking about Greek mythology here today), stepped in and gave human beings two important gifts. The first was fire and the second was this idea of hope and fire would be the thing that would symbolize the ability to move society forward. Hope or blind hope would be the thing that would be the impetus inside that would create optimism. That human life could be better tomorrow than it would be today, in a very simplistic way. 

That drove the first idea of philanthropy. The Greeks took this very seriously “Philos and Anthropos,” (love of humankind) is the foundation of the word philanthropy that we use today. Note that it doesn't say money. I spend a lot of time with non-fundraising individuals, physicians, faculty members, board members, and community leaders to remind them that we've created in the last 150 years this direct connection between fundraising, philanthropy, and money. It doesn't mean that. It means the willingness, the desire to make the world a better place. Bill and Melinda Gates said it best a couple of years ago in their letter that they wrote to the community about their philanthropic efforts. The number one reason they do it is they love it. They love knowing they make a difference -- that they're helping people. Yes, their money does that, but that's not the reason it actually occurs. 

Let's go back to the ancient Greeks for just a minute. In ancient Greek times, there were groups of people that gathered, usually, they were on the upper end of the social-economic ladder. They were just rich and mostly all men to be candid. They would gather together and they would support various parts of their community. For those who had resources and they didn't want to participate, they would put pressure on them. Where do you think our modern nonprofit board comes from? They would support things like the theaters or community aspects of need, like city walls or greeneries, temples, or municipal amenities that the common everyday Greek didn't have. Even Plato's Academy in just about 400 BC was endowed and ran for 900 years on that endowment. Plato's Academy was about learning and about the full essence of what it meant to be human. 

Other communities or societies of the time also had philanthropy in different ways, running through their culture. The Babylonians had a decree that was a special punishment for those who were very wealthy but abused the weak. We also know that in ancient Greece, there was a book, a writing called The Book of the Dead, which made it very clear that successful passage to the other side was in many ways dependent on the life's record of one's benevolence, generosity towards those who were suffering when they were alive.

Of course, the Roman empire took much of the ideas of the ancient Greeks, Babylonians, and the Egyptians because they had captured much of that territory in the Roman empire days of grandeur. They actually created the first tax-exempt condition for charities who gave out to society. They created laws that exalted philanthropists to elevate them into statuses that allowed things like trusts and endowments to be created.

What's so interesting is that after the fall of the Roman empire, the dark ages, the idea of philanthropy basically disappears from historical writing. It isn't until the 1600’s that we begin to see a real drive for philanthropy to come back into probably closer to our modern society. It was the English who first passed the statute of charitable uses, which is the cornerstone of Anglo-Saxon Anglo-American charity laws. It was for the relief of the poor. They actually created statutes, laws about how charity should be used. And as there was an exodus from England and Europe to then just the American colonies or American land. It wasn't even obviously the United States at the time. In 1630, John Winthrop, one of the lead Puritans, talked about it from the perspective on the ship coming to America, the model, modern Christian charity about how their strive for business needed to drive their philanthropy, their charity, to help others.

As we move into more of a modern American history. Ben Franklin created The Junto Club of Philadelphia. It was there to improve society. It was really the first major modern grouping of men, white, to drive a betterment of the community. They created things like the volunteer fire department, the police and built roads and libraries. Ben Franklin just 25 years later created the first matching grant scenario to build the hospital in Philadelphia, where the city of Philadelphia would grant dollars based on how much money could be raised philanthropically.

We also then began to have laws that drove philanthropic doctrine. In 1819, the state of New Hampshire wanted to take over Dartmouth College. In the case, Dartmouth College versus Woodward, the Supreme court said no, nonprofit entities have protection from government interference. You can't just go in and take over a nonprofit and it set up a special existence for nonprofits to exist in this world.

You have the first Jewish Sunday school and Jewish orphanage established in 1838. You have another Supreme court case, Girard vs. Philadelphia, where a gentleman wanted to leave his estate for a specific purpose. The city didn't like it and said, well, you can't do that. The Supreme Court said no, individuals have the right to leave their money to charity, and the idea of donor intent was created legally. The donors can say where their money goes and the organization or the entity or the receiver has to use it in that purpose. 

We had societies that were developed after the Civil War, moving closer to the latter part of the 19th century, where Josephine Shaw Lowell published the most famous book, probably of its time called the Public Relief and Private Charity. Five years later influenced by that book, Andrew Carnegie writes The Gospel of Wealth, the book that defined how money can help the community and help other people rather than be hoarded, which affected John D. Rockefeller and others. We had the first income tax law passed in 1894. World War I, there was $400 million donated and Red Cross membership. Large-scale grassroots efforts would go to help take care of servicemen serving in Europe. In World War II, we had drives of scrap metal and all kinds of things. We spend so much time thinking about what philanthropy is today. I think it's sometimes important to look back and realize what it's done.

The other thing I want to do very quickly is walk you through some of the things that charity, philanthropy, the generosity of others started.  Colleges are prevalent, whether it's John Harvard in 1838, I believe, giving his estate to rename the university, Harvard College. It's Thomas Jefferson leaving his entire estate, for the most part, to the University of Virginia. It's Booker T. Washington in 1867-68, creating the Tuskegee Institute. It's John D. Rockefeller and Marshall Fields, founding the University of Chicago in 1890. It's Leland Stanford, and his wife establishing Stanford University in 1891. 

How about the idea of public education? In 1806 and 1808 in New York and Boston, societies and gatherings raised money to begin the public education system for those who couldn't afford private schooling or tutoring. It's the idea of Elizabeth Seton and the sisters of St. Joseph creating the first free Catholic school in Baltimore in 1810, or Thomas Gallaudet creating the first school for the deaf in 1817. The basic elements of our education system founded in philanthropy, including public education. 

Libraries, Andrew Carnegie spent his entire latter half of his life building libraries across the United States and around the world. 1,681 public libraries in the United States. If a small town were to agree to find the books and use the money correctly, Andrew Carnegie would make a library possible. There are a thousand or more Carnegie libraries in the United States and additional 830 or so around the English-speaking world. 

Hospitals, I think about the doctors and nurses and then the nuns and religious orders who went out across the United States in the 1800-1900s and started hospitals, two, three-bed hospitals in these small communities that are today the outcome of some of the biggest health systems in the United States. The first orphanage done by charity, by philanthropy in 1825. How about the Arts? Let's just take the Boston Symphony, the first Henry Lee Higgins in 1881. Emergency care, Clara Barton and the Red Cross 1881. And even environmental, the great John Mirror founded the Sierra Club in 1892. Philanthropy has defined our societies and cultures as far back as we can go in the writings of humankind.

The question we have today is what is this going to be for us looking forward? What can philanthropy do? This goes back to other writings and other podcasts, the bigger we think the more we partner with the nonprofit’s goal and its mission, the more we take that partnership into the community and find people who believe in it to support it. The more we gather that support both monetarily, but maybe more importantly, emotionally, spiritually, psychologically, mentally, the more likely our community is going to be a better place. All the things that I just talked about made the world better. Philanthropy has the power to change the direction of humankind.

Just a couple of reminders, if you like this, either video, which is now available on YouTube or on the podcast, I hope you'll subscribe, like, give a thumbs up, and make sure to leave a note. I appreciate it very much. And if you'd like to get a hold of me or if you have a suggestion on topic podcast@hallettphilanthropy.com, or if you disagree with something, I said, reeks@hallettphilanthropy.com. I'm posting blogs all the time, 90-second reads back at the website, www.hallettphilanthropy.com. 

Today was a look back, but it really is meant, I hope to give you a thought that what you're doing, if you're a part of this industry, as a board member, as an employee, as a leader, as a practitioner, as a faculty member, whatever it is that you're doing, a volunteer, history says the world's a better place when philanthropy is at the center of it. They call it the Dark Ages for a lot of different reasons, but I find it interesting that philanthropy seems to be non-existent in writing in history during that same time. I'm going to make a leap-- the more philanthropy, not just the money, but helping others, the better society is, the less dark it is. 

Thus, what you're doing is making a difference, and don't forget, “Some people make things happen. Some people watch things happen. Then there are those who wondered what happened.” Philanthropy is about people who want to make things happen, doing just that for people wondering what happened. If you can't get out of bed every morning thinking, this is really cool. Yes, I can be a part of that then I don't know what will. This is a vocational call and I hope you feel it a little bit more tomorrow than you did today. I appreciate your time and our look back in the history of philanthropy. We'll be back with you next time, right here on “Around with Randall”. Don't forget -- Make it a great day!