The John M. Olin Foundation was a grant-making foundation established in 1953 by John M. Olin, president of the Olin Industries chemical and munitions manufacturing businesses. The general purpose of the John M. Olin Foundation was to provide support for projects that reflected or were intended to strengthen the economic, political and cultural institutions upon which the American heritage of constitutional government and private enterprise is based. The Foundation also sought to promote a general understanding of these institutions by encouraging the thoughtful study of the connections between economic and political freedoms, and the cultural heritage that sustains them. Unlike most non-profit foundations, the John M. Olin Foundation was charged to spend all of its assets within a generation of Olin's death, for fear of mission drift over time. It made its last grant in the summer of 2005 and officially disbanded on November 29 of that year after having disbursed over $370 million in funding, primarily to conservative think tanks, media outlets, and law programs at influential universities. The Foundation is most notable for its early support and funding of the law and economics movement.
Looks like the Olin Foundation did some good. Better yet, it was money that did not go to the Feds to be wasted.
Today, we have the Gates and Dell foundations, each will do better work with their money then the Feds.