Associate Professor of Economics Roger Butters is the new Walter E. Williams Chair in Free Market Economics, College President Larry Arnn said at a Center for Constructive Alternatives luncheon on Monday.
“Economic freedom has done more to create wealth for the masses than any other idea ever conceived,” Butters said. “It has the power to eliminate poverty and deliver human dignity. Walter Williams was one of the greatest champions of economic freedom the world has ever known. Establishing a chair in his name helps ensure that his ideas and legacy are not forgotten.”
Endowed by the McBroom family, the chair honors Walter Williams, a conservative economist, commentator, and academic, who died in December 2020. Williams was the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, as well as a syndicated columnist, author, and a substitute host for the “Rush Limbaugh Show.”
“He was a free man, and he freed himself by his mind and his character,” Arnn said. “He was a thinker, a teacher, a husband, and a father, and there are no higher stations.”
Arnn said Williams, who was African American, faced discrimination for his race during his life.
Williams opposed the use of force, Arnn said, advocating for free-market economics. He spoke against the welfare state, socialism, and socialized medicine.
“The undeniable truth is that neither slavery nor Jim Crow nor the harshest racism has decimated the black family the way the welfare state has,” Williams wrote in the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal in 2017.
Williams’ daughter, Devon, said teaching was her father’s gift and passion.
“He was an educator, specifically an economics professor, but broadly, a teacher,” Devon said. “That’s who he was, and he loved being a teacher. In fact, many years ago at the dinner table he told me ‘On the day I die, I’d like to have taught a class,’ and he did just exactly that. He taught his final Ph.D. course and then passed away in his car.”
Devon said Williams considered all of his platforms “his big classroom.”
“He completed his undergraduate and master’s degrees, plus his Ph.D. by going to school for 10 years straight, summers included,” Devon said. “In his lifetime he wrote 10 books, hundreds of articles, book reviews, scholarly journal articles, and more than 1,000 weekly columns. He also gave hundreds of talks around the world. You can also find him on TV and radio.”
Williams had a gift for breaking down complex economic ideas and making them digestible for any audience, Devon said. She said she learned a number of practical lessons from her father, including how to drive, the importance of hard work, planning for the future, fixing broken appliances, and prioritizing family.
Butters said he is honored to receive the chair position.
“Hillsdale College is one of the remaining champions of free market economics in the academic world,” Butters said. “This chair is both a recognition of and a further commitment to those ideals. I look forward to advocating for freedom and hope to do justice to Walter William’s memory.”
Butters encouraged students to study Williams.
“Walter Williams was an extraordinary man who deserves your attention,” Butters said. “If you have not discovered Williams or his good friend Thomas Sowell, it’s time you got to know them. You should feel urgency around getting to know these men and their ideas.”
Even though Williams has died, his lessons live on, according to Devon.
“Because of Mr. McBroom and his generous endowment of this chair, my dad’s passion for teaching and commitment to his students and economic principles will also endure,” Devon said.
