American Conservative Union

US conservative advocacy organisation founded in 1964; organiser of the Conservative Political Action Conference

American Conservative Union
Type	501(c)(4) advocacy organisation (EIN 52-0810813)
Founded	December 1964 (first board meeting 18 December 1964)
Headquarters	Alexandria, Virginia (address on the organisation's IRS record: 1199 N Fairfax Street, Suite 500, Alexandria, VA 22314)
Key people	Matt Schlapp (chairman, as listed on the organisation's website in October 2016)
Website	https://www.conservative.org/

The American Conservative Union (ACU) is a US conservative advocacy organisation founded in December 1964. It is a 501(c)(4) organisation, employer identification number 52-0810813. For many years it has organised the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) and has published ratings of congressional voting records.

Founding and early history

ACU's own history page, as archived in 2007, dates the organisation's establishment to early December 1964, after a meeting on 7 November 1964, five days after Barry Goldwater's defeat in that year's presidential election. It names among those involved Frank S. Meyer, John Chamberlain, Jameson Campaigne Sr., John Ashbrook, Katharine St. George, William F. Buckley Jr., L. Brent Bozell and Robert E. Bauman, who organised the founding meeting. The first meeting of the original board of directors was held on 18 December 1964 at the Statler Hilton (later the Capital Hilton) in Washington, D.C. Members included those already named, together with Lammot Copeland, Peter O'Donnell, John A. Howard and Indiana congressman Donald C. Bruce, who was elected the first chairman. The formal announcement came in a statement by Bruce on 21 December 1964. The history gives the organisation's original three-fold mission as: "consolidate the overall strength of the American conservative movement through unified leadership and action, mold public opinion, and stimulate and direct responsible political action."

John Ashbrook succeeded Bruce as chairman on 2 October 1965. Later chairmen named in the same history include M. Stanton Evans (from February 1971), Philip M. Crane (from February 1977), Bob Bauman (from 1979), Marvin "Mickey" Edwards, and, from December 1984, David A. Keene. In 1984, the history records, the board adopted a by-law that future chairmen would be "public citizens rather than government employees". The organisation was incorporated as a nonprofit on 28 June 1979. The Internal Revenue Service ruling date on its exemption record is 1 February 1980.

The 2007 history says that ACU compiled its first "Rating of Congress" in 1971, and that in 1974 it "took the lead in sponsoring the first Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC)". A later "What We Do" page, archived in October 2016, stated that "every year since 1973, ACU proudly hosts CPAC". Both dates are the organisation's own wording.

Activities

The 2016 "What We Do" page described CPAC as "the nation's largest gathering of conservatives" and said ACU's congressional ratings, issued since 1971, scored members of Congress on taxes, government spending, cultural issues, defence and foreign policy, with the votes "not announced in advance". It also described state legislative ratings and distinguished the American Conservative Union Foundation (ACUF) as a 501(c)(3) educational foundation. The same site listed Matt Schlapp as chairman.

The 2007 history records earlier campaigns, including opposition to President Nixon's Family Assistance Plan, a 1971 "Declaration Relating To President Nixon" suspending support for the administration, backing for Ashbrook's 1972 primary challenge, an independent advertising effort for Ronald Reagan's 1976 campaign, and campaigns against the Panama Canal treaties and the SALT II treaty. It also describes ACU's role in the formation of what became the American Legislative Exchange Council, first as an ad hoc project in 1969 and later as a formal ACU project in 1975, before ALEC became independent.

Later identity and website

When conservative.org was retrieved on 11 November 2026, the live site presented itself under a CPAC Foundation banner, stating: "Founded in 1964, the CPAC Foundation is the nation's oldest conservative grassroots organization." Contact details on that page included 515 King Street, Suite 300, Alexandria, Virginia 22314, and the telephone number (202) 347-9388. The IRS record retrieved the same day still listed the organisation as "American Conservative Union", EIN 52-0810813, at 1199 N Fairfax Street, Suite 500, Alexandria, Virginia 22314–1445. This page treats the 1964 founding history as ACU's own earlier account, and records the later CPAC-branded wording as it appeared on the live site, without treating the two names as having been shown, in the sources opened here, to be a formal legal conversion.

Finances

The table uses totals from Form 990 filings compiled in ProPublica's Nonprofit Explorer. The filings identify the organisation as a 501(c)(4) (subsection 4). Periods through December 2017 are calendar years; from 2018 the filings are for periods ending in March.

American Conservative Union Form 990 totals (US dollars)

Tax period ending	Revenue	Expenses	Assets at period end
31 March 2023	10,922,984	10,976,991	4,291,110
31 March 2022	15,442,633	14,320,322	4,885,240
31 March 2021	8,116,706	8,501,833	3,320,784
31 March 2020	19,887,494	18,640,526	4,131,915
31 March 2019	16,702,315	31,798,084	6,785,195
31 March 2018	3,359,168	2,368,393	1,724,239
31 December 2017	9,256,639	9,640,633	616,899
31 December 2016	8,067,626	6,955,602	1,291,202
31 December 2015	9,130,446	9,075,427	2,424,576
31 December 2014	6,423,057	6,055,518	1,900,122

A later return for the period ending 31 March 2025 was listed in the same record but had not been parsed into the project's line-item database when the record was retrieved, so its figures are not used here. Officer names were not included in the parsed totals and were not taken from an opened complete Form 990 PDF.

External links

• conservative.org
• ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer, American Conservative Union
• ACU history page, 2007 archive