About

Edward H. Crane – Founder & President

Edward H. Crane is widely regarded as one of the driving forces behind the rapidly growing libertarian movement in the United States. Born in Los Angeles on August 15, 1944, Crane holds a B.S. degree from the University of California, Berkeley and an M.B.A. in finance and investments in 1968 from the University of Southern California Graduate School of Business. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

He worked in Los Angeles as a portfolio manager for the investment firm of Scudder, Stevens & Clark and then as vice president in the San Francisco office of Alliance Capital Management Corp. until 1977. A delegate to the founding convention of the Libertarian Party in Denver, Colorado in 1972, Crane was elected national chairman of the party in 1974, a position he held until 1977, when he co-founded the Cato Institute in San Francisco. He served as president and CEO of Cato from 1977 through 2012, when he became president emeritus.

Today, Ed Crane is president of the Purple PAC, a super PAC devoted to supporting ideas and candidates consistent with dynamic market capitalism (as opposed to crony capitalism), social tolerance, and a skepticism of American attempts to be the world’s policeman. He was publisher of The Crane Report: Notes from Babylon-by-the-Potomac, a monthly newsletter from a libertarian perspective.

Ed Crane serves on the boards of the Center for Competitive Politics, Americans for Limited Government, and U.S. Term Limits. He is married to the former Kristina Knall and they have three children, Geoffrey, Kathleen and Mary. Their dog, Wolfgang, served for several years as assistant director of security at the Cato Institute.