The post-Nixon Campaign Finance Reform law had recently created the political action committee as a legal entity.

The board of Heritage was predominantly northeastern fiscal conservatives, and after Roe v. Wade was decided, they refused to engage on the abortion issue.

"[3] The foundation's Center for Technology Policy and Coalition for Constitutional Liberties has opposed the USA PATRIOT Act, ECHELON, a national ID card and other measures often supported by conservatives for fighting crime, terrorism and illegal immigration.

Its Center for Law and Democracy and its Coalition for Judicial Restraint have criticized Republican Senators for not being aggressive enough in blocking liberal nominees or in confirming certain conservatives.

The FCF has promoted what it sees as a philosophy of judicial restraint, in which judges largely defer to the elected branches of government on controversial political and cultural decisions.

The individual most closely associated with this philosophy-and the chief exponent for the Free Congress Foundation's views on this subject for many years-is Thomas Jipping, who has made numerous appearances on television and radio, as well as in both print and online media, supporting conservative judicial nominations put forward by the Bush administration and conversely, opposing what he considered liberal nominees chosen by the previous Clinton administration.

Instead he urged conservatives to invest their time and money in alternative institutions, which would, in his viewpoint, eventually become the norm due to the superior efficacy of traditional values.

FCF took a hardline anti-communist stance in the Cold War, rejecting détente and arms control and supporting efforts to overthrow communist governments.

However, other than Strategic Defense Initiative which it strongly backed, FCF did not fully endorse the Reagan program of spending on expensive weapon systems, a stance it continues to this day.

Many organizations bought the rights to air programs on the channel, including the National Rifle Association, the Christian Coalition, the Cato Institute, Accuracy in Media and others.

The channel featured high production values and cost a great deal and in response to donor and investor pressure for a clear focus, FCF dropped all programs not directly related to public policy and conservative activism, and rebranded the channel as NET: The Conservative NewsTalk Network, with the initials NET no longer standing for anything and the nine-dot logo replaced with one evoking the US Capitol dome.

In a decision he later came to regret bitterly, Weyrich turned over day-to-day operation of the channel to an industry veteran who had been successful with other startups.

After a power struggle which Weyrich lost, NET was rebranded again into "America's Voice", and the channel abandoned all conservative identity, marketing itself merely as a non-ideological way for the public to make its views known to policymakers.

Eventually America's Voice was sold, becoming "The Renaissance Network" (TRN), airing on a few broadcast stations, mainly UHF and low-power channels.