Peter Lewis made his fortune writing high-risk auto insurance policies through the company his father founded in 1937. As CEO of
Progressive Insurance from 1965-2000, he built the company from tiny to the 3
rd largest auto insurer in the country by the time of his death in 2013, with 26,000 employees and $16 billion in annual sales.
He built other things as well. In 2012 he pledged to give away at least half his personal fortune of more than $1 billion, and gave at least $233 million to Princeton, among many other organizations.
One of his other passions was the reform of drug laws. Arrested himself for possession of marijuana in New Zealand, he gave millions to the cause. He said his use of marijuana was primarily for pain that resulted from the amputation of a leg in 1998.
In 2007, he gave $3 million to the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP). In 2010, he gave a little over $200,000 to groups working to legalize marijuana in California. He also donated to efforts in Colorado and Washington. Today, his son Jonathan Lewis supports some of the same causes.
“He gave millions to reforming marijuana policy,” said Morgan Fox, communications manager for MPP. “He helped us out considerably.”
Lewis, whose father died when he was still in high school, joined Progressive as an underwriting trainee after his graduation from Princeton and, in 1965, he and his mother used their stock in Progressive as collateral to borrow $2.5 million to buy out the rest of the stockholders. He became CEO of the company, which at the time had 40 employees.
California was the first state to legalize medical marijuana in 1996, and was the first state to vote on legalizing recreational use in 2010, when the effort failed. It is building up a head of steam right now for another try in 2016.
Lewis, of course, is not the only well-known donor to legalization causes. In California, Sean Parker, co-founder of Napster and one-time president of Facebook, is a high-profile supporter.
“I’ve been following this issue with great interest for some time. It’s very encouraging to see a vibrant community of activists, many of whom have dedicated their lives to this issue, coming together around a sensible reform based measure,” Parker said in a prepared statement.
