As a former certified public accountant (CPA) with decades of experience— including 3 years at the IRS following his graduation in the 1970s and 18 years currently the Tax Partner with a private investment company comprised of angel investors—Cato Sponsor Ken Criss understands the importance of Cato’s prudent stewardship of the assets entrusted to it by the Institute’s community of Sponsors. Cato celebrates the Institute’s financial stability thanks to the incredible generosity of its Sponsor community and is committed to using its resources to continue the fight against government intrusions against our liberty.

“For the past 30 years, I have been contributing to Cato annually and have attended many of the Cato Sponsor, education, and celebration events,” Ken says. “My wife, Terry, and I have seen the difference that Cato has made in bringing to congressional and public eyes the validity of libertarian ideals and have provided for Cato in our wills. Cato has accumulated a large endowment, but we want it to be even larger to advance its promotion of liberty to the forefront of American values where it belongs.”

Like many Cato Sponsors, Ken’s encounters with politics pushed him toward libertarianism. But few Sponsors can speak from the direct experience of having worked at the IRS.

“Upon graduation from college, I had faith in government policies and went to work for the IRS in 1970,” Ken explains. “When Nixon tasked my division with audits and enforcement of his wage and price controls in 1973, I was unable to do this job in good conscience. I left the IRS and developed a CPA practice with a new skepticism toward government policies.”

Of course, the next president, Democrat Jimmy Carter, in 1976 replaced the Republican administration and brought record-high inflation and interest rates along with a recession, not to mention exercising the unenumerated power of creating a brand-new Department of Education. Disenchanted by the left and right, Ken “began pursuing a libertarian alternative to government.”

“In a world of governments that thrive on compromising citizen liberty for a higher good, Cato has been steadfast in fighting against these liberty incursions for all of these years of my support,” Ken observes. “I do not know of anyone whom I do not respect at Cato. In this changing world, by contrast, I cannot name 5 out of 535 federal politicians I admire and 20 of 535 that I respect.

“There is very little in my life of which I am more proud than being a Sponsor of Cato. The best hope for America is that Cato, the Institute for Justice, and a few others will ultimately win over the minds of the collectivist populace,” Ken concludes.

Everyone at Cato is honored to have Ken and Terry as active Sponsors. We thank all our Sponsors for partnering with Cato to defend the ideas that will create a freer, more prosperous world.