Heritage's mission, from the beginning, has been to provide timely, credible information for policymakers (especially members of Congress) and the media about the vital issues facing America. Never content and never satisfied, Heritage has continued to transform the nation's policies. Over the last twenty-five years, the foundation has played a key role in almost every major public policy debate in Washington, including the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), enterprise zones, health care, Social Security, the flat tax, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), welfare reform, telecommunications deregulation, congressional reform, and the culture war. - Foreword.

One cannot begin to understand the modern conservative movement in American politics without knowing the 25 year-history of The Heritage Foundation, the most influential public policy think tank in Washington for almost two decades. Many of the significant players of the conservative movement and the many strands of conservative thought are illuminated for the first time in this splendid account by the celebrated biographer and historian Lee Edwards. The story of The Heritage Foundation, told in this book, is fascinating, often thrilling, and vital to know if one is seeking to understand the politics of the last several decades and what lies ahead -- now that Heritage and its conservative allies have come to dominate policy battles in Washington, D.C. - Publisher.