Gingrich’s College Course Linked to Republican PAC : Politics: House panel is reviewing complaint about its financing. Speaker maintains his class is nonpartisan.

From all appearances, the white-haired professor at the wood-grain lectern could be teaching one of thousands of college history courses across the country.

But this particular class--Renewing American Civilization--is unlike any other.

The weekly two-hour sessions are beamed nationwide via satellite to about a dozen college campuses and to millions of private households, churches, military bases and even businesses. At least several thousand viewers have gone so far as to send in $229.99 for a set of videotapes of the lectures and other course materials.

The curriculum shuns historical recitations. Instead, it focuses relentlessly on the professor’s desire to overturn present-day U.S. social policy. Sessions typically begin with a call to abolish “the welfare state,” for instance. And among the course’s stated goals are training 200,000 “citizen activists” and establishing the terms of debate for next year’s presidential election.

The instructor: House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the only known member of the 104th Congress who teaches an accredited college course.

Still, were these its only distinctions, Renewing American Civilization would be just another example of the Republican leader’s masterful way of using media, innovative tactics and brash ideas to thrust his party to preeminence.

The differences go further, however. They reflect a more ambiguous characteristic of what awed members of the Speaker’s entourage call “Newt World”: a commingling of his academic endeavors, his politics, and the fund raising of a private tax-exempt educational foundation in ways that open him to questions about ethical considerations.

Renewing American Civilization, although laced with political ideology, is produced by a nonprofit foundation linked to Gingrich that has raised more than $1.7 million in tax-deductible contributions. Federal law prohibits the use of tax-deductible funds to advance a partisan political agenda.

Similarly, although the course has originated from accredited institutions of higher learning--first from Kennesaw State College and now from Reinhardt College, a small denominational school in Waleska, Ga., Gingrich’s presentations plainly stand outside the normal curriculum.

And it is clear from internal records and interviews with those involved that fund raising to launch the course at Kennesaw in 1993 was managed primarily by a political committee called GOPAC, which Gingrich controls and which also raises millions of dollars for Republican candidates all across the country.

Moreover, private corporations--including some that are also big GOPAC donors--provided financial and other support for the course, then got promotional plugs from Gingrich during his video lectures. Several donors who gave large contributions to the tax-exempt foundation, the Progress and Freedom Foundation, received assistance from Gingrich in his role as a congressman as well.

The House Ethics Committee announced Feb. 15 that it will review a complaint charging that Gingrich used GOPAC to finance the course and that he improperly aided a course donor. The allegations are included in a complaint filed by Ben Jones, a Democrat who was defeated by Gingrich in November.

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Gingrich maintains that his course is strictly nonpartisan, legal and ethical. The Speaker said last week that he welcomes the opportunity to respond when the Ethics Committee is ready.

“But for the moment, my defeated opponent, various embittered Democrats, various folks who ideologically disagree with me have each come up with spurious charges,” Gingrich said.

Jeffrey A. Eisenach, a Gingrich confidant who ran GOPAC before starting the Progress and Freedom Foundation and managing the televised course, said Gingrich has in fact kept his various activities completely separate.

“What you can’t separate is Newt,” Eisenach said. “You can’t cut him in half. He is a person. He is at once a very powerful intellect who is really thinking about ideas and really trying to understand where the country is and the big picture. And at the same time, he is a partisan politician.”

A chronicle of events surrounding the course, however, as well as hundreds of internal documents obtained through a Georgia public records request, show that the lines separating Gingrich’s varied activities were anything but clear.

Gingrich had begun his working life teaching history and geography at West Georgia College. In mid-1977, when his seven-year probationary period ended, he did not seek tenure because he was in the midst of his third bid to win a seat in Congress. That effort was successful, and for a time the former professor devoted himself almost exclusively to politics.

In 1992, however, Gingrich expressed interest in teaching a college course on television. At the same time, Timothy S. Mescon, dean of the Kennesaw State School of Business, was seeking the congressman’s help in soliciting a government contract for The Mescon Group, a business consulting firm run by his father, Michael D. Mescon.

Soon, Gingrich and Mescon were also discussing the possibility that the congressman would teach a course beginning in the fall of 1993 using Kennesaw, in Marietta, Ga., as his base. A plan evolved, with Mescon eventually becoming Gingrich’s co-professor. (At Kennesaw, and later at Reinhardt, the school has assigned a co-professor to provide additional balancing material to the course--but only for students enrolled at the base school; those who watch the course on television or on videocassette do not see the co-professor or receive the additional material).

Between September, 1992, and February, 1993, Gingrich and Timothy Mescon exchanged several letters pertaining to the proposed college course as well as the consulting firm’s search for government business in West Africa.

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In one letter, Gingrich wrote that he had contacted the administrator for the Agency of International Development on Mescon’s behalf. At the bottom of the letter, Gingrich hand-wrote that he was “very interested” in working with Mescon on the college course.

Gingrich’s efforts did not land any international consulting work for The Mescon Group, and Timothy Mescon insists his negotiations with Gingrich over the course were not related to his attempts to get help for The Mescon Group.

“There was no linkage,” said Mescon, adding that he requested Gingrich’s help as his constituent. “I may have been grossly naive about all of this (but) there were no subversive motives at all on my part.”

Gingrich needed to raise more than $200,000 to cover videotaping and televising the course across the country. He personally began soliciting hefty tax-deductible contributions from loyal backers.

In August, 1993, Gingrich wrote a letter requesting $50,000 from Richard J. Fox, a former Republican Jewish Coalition chairman who was a $10,000-per-year charter member of GOPAC. Gingrich said the course “may be the most important project of my career” and noted that he looked forward to dining with Fox the next month. Fox donated $20,000 to the course through his personal foundation.

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Gingrich also turned to GOPAC executive director Eisenach and the group’s chief fund-raiser. GOPAC is best known for raising more than $7 million for the Republican cause from 1988 to 1993. Much of this money was used under Gingrich’s direction to recruit, train and elect candidates nationwide.

According to more than 500 pages of internal documents, GOPAC--including its employees, office equipment, stationery and fund-raising lists--was the primary instrument for getting the $200,000 raised for the course.

GOPAC fund-raising director Pamela H. Prochnow repeatedly solicited donations for the course from GOPAC donors and others. And Eisenach said Gingrich asked him in spring, 1993, to serve as project director in charge of financing and managing the course.

They negotiated a complex agreement in which Eisenach resigned from GOPAC while his consulting firm developed the course and also retained GOPAC as a client. As part of the deal, GOPAC provided office space to Eisenach’s consulting firm.

At the same time, Eisenach said, he was starting a conservative think tank, the Progress and Freedom Foundation. Its first project was writing a textbook for Gingrich’s course.

In October, 1993, Kennesaw decided to drop the course.

Officials at the school said they had been surprised to learn after the course was offered for fall, 1993, that GOPAC was Gingrich’s political committee. Mescon said it is now evident that political and academic resources were commingled.

Such an arrangement is “just not appropriate on a state university campus,” Mescon said. “In hindsight, we would never do this again. There’s no question about that. . . . I feel horrendous about this thing, and it’s embarrassing.”

In need of a new home for the course, Gingrich again turned to Eisenach. This time, Eisenach signed a deal to have the Progress and Freedom Foundation manage the course exclusively, even though he had reservations about the PFF being tagged “the Gingrich Foundation.”

Since then, the foundation has handled both the fund raising and production of Gingrich’s course, which spent $483,476 in 1993-94. The foundation reported that it spent $94,712 on a separate televised call-in show Gingrich co-hosts.

The foundation has been recognized by the Internal Revenue Service as an educational organization, which means its income is tax-exempt and its donors may deduct contributions. To maintain this status, a foundation must be organized and operated exclusively for education. The PFF’s largest single expenditure is producing and promoting Gingrich’s course on television. But critics have challenged its tax status.

Without taking a position, Lee A. Sheppard, a tax lawyer and contributing editor for the weekly magazine Tax Notes, identified several troubling aspects of the foundation’s handling of the course. These include the marketing of the course to GOPAC and other partisan Republican supporters and the foundation’s hiring of a Republican pollster to do a post-election survey last year.

The PFF insists that the course is entirely nonpartisan in its content. “It is unambiguously a research and educational activity because it is an accredited class on a college campus,” Eisenach said.

Although employees of GOPAC, the foundation and Eisenach’s consulting firm worked in the same office for several months, Eisenach said he sought to erect fire walls between GOPAC’s political activity and management of the course.

Still, he conceded, “in doing what a college would do, we weren’t as sensitive as we could have been to what that would look like in the political environment.”

From the outset, critics have claimed that GOPAC’s heavy involvement is just one of many indications of the highly partisan nature of the course.

In a draft letter that encouraged 1,000 College Republican chapters to enroll in his course by video, Gingrich wrote that conservatives “face a challenge larger than stopping President Clinton.” And when Gingrich was asked by the Kennesaw College student newspaper if he intended to strike a balance in his course, he replied: “No. I’m going to allow Democrats, but not liberal ideas.”

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Faculty members at Kennesaw protested the use of resources at the publicly funded college to promote Gingrich’s views. In 1993, several instructors wrote the Kennesaw dean: “It appears that we are all acting as a part of the reelection campaign for Mr. Gingrich, or laying the groundwork for his future political ambitions.”

Many academicians also criticize Gingrich for promoting in his video classroom the corporate interests that helped produce the course.

A five-page “Request for Funding” letter sent to potential donors in June, 1993, pledged that $50,000 sponsors “will work directly with the leadership of the Renewing American Civilization project in the course development process.” Those who give $25,000 will “be invited to participate in the course development process.”

Among the corporate donors that Gingrich has praised since the course was moved to Reinhardt are Scientific Atlanta, Hewlett-Packard Co., Turner Broadcasting System Inc. and Lockheed Corp.

During a “Health and Wellness” lecture on Feb. 19, 1994, Gingrich touted tax-exempt medical saver accounts championed by Golden Rule Insurance Co. as nothing less than “the most important new idea in health care.” Golden Rule donated an undisclosed sum to the Progress and Freedom Foundation, Golden Rule Chairman J. Patrick Rooney gave GOPAC $95,150 and Rooney and his relatives have contributed $7,415 to Gingrich’s campaign committee since 1992. Later in the lecture, Gingrich introduced the subject of “quality in health care as exemplified by HealthSouth, which is a rehabilitative hospital system that’s doing tremendous work.” HealthSouth contributed $15,000 to the course. In addition, its employees gave $29,850 to Gingrich’s campaign in the 1994 election cycle.

Eisenach said some companies that were asked to give are not mentioned in the course while others that didn’t contribute are prominently featured.

Officials at Reinhardt College, a 112-year-old Methodist school with 964 students, are happy with the course. Says Reinhardt President Floyd Falany: “To the degree this course and its content might serve some political purpose for the Republican Party down the road, I really believe we can only be responsible for what is happening to our students here. I feel good about it. I trust the Speaker 100%.”

Times staff writer Dwight Morris and researcher D’Jamila Salem contributed to this story.

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Anatomy of a Contribution

March, 1993: Rep. Newt Gingrich approaches Richard B. Berman about helping to sponsor Gingrich’s college course, “Renewing American Civilization,” at Kennesaw State College. Berman is a lobbyist and executive director of Employment Policies Institute, which represents 30 restaurants, fast-food chains, hotels and other businesses.

May, 1993: Berman meets with the fundraising director for GOPAC, a Republican political action committee headed by Gingrich. The fund-raiser writes that Berman expressed interest in giving $20,000 to $25,000 if the course can incorporate certain ideas that concern Berman’s restaurant chain clients.

July 1, 1993: Berman sends a $25,000 check payable to the college to Gingrich on behalf of the Employment Policies Institute. On the cover letter, Berman writes: “Newt--Thanks again for the help on today’s committee hearing.” That day, Berman testifies at a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on behalf of another client, the American Beverage Institute. He voices opposition to a pending bill to lower the blood-alcohol level for drunk driving.

1994: Berman contributes another $5,000 for Gingrich’s course.

Sept. 7, 1994: In a House ethics committee complaint, Ben Jones, Gingrich’s November election opponent, cites the Berman note and check as one of several alleged violations of House rules. In an amended complaint filed Jan. 26, 1995, Jones charges that the transaction violated federal bribery laws.

February, 1995: Gingrich vows that he’ll be cleared of all of Jones’ allegations. Berman calls Jones’ charge “ludicrous.” He says he added the reference to the hearing because Gingrich’s office was one of several he had called seeking to get on the witness list, and he decided to thank Gingrich in case the lawmaker had helped. But Berman says subcommittee staff put him on the panel and “Gingrich didn’t even know about the call.”

Source: Kennesaw State College files, House and campaign records and interviews