So says Jagdish Bhagwati about the recent objections by 100 or so University of Chicago faculty members to the establishment of the Milton Friedman Institute. (HT: Chicago Tribune). Here’s the whole quote as reported from the Chicago Tribune:
“It is nonsensical to object. . . . Chicago should be proud it has someone like Milton on its rolls … . Anybody who can claim that Milton was not one of the major thinkers of his time is crazy.
A copy of the letter sent to the U of C President and Provost is available here. The faculty proposal for the MFI is here. I cant find the identities of the signatories anywhere. I’m particularly interested to know whether any members of the University of Chicago Law School signed this or alternatively, have publicly supported the Milton Friedman Institute given that its mission as described in the Tribune article includes “attract[ing] visiting scholars who will conduct research on topics related to economics, business and law.” The proposal indicates that Eric Posner is the sole law school member of the MFI faculty committee, along with Lars Peter Hansen, Gary Becker, John Cochrane, James Heckman, Robert Lucas, and Kevin Murphy.