Cruz attended high school at Faith West Academy in Katy, Texas,[26] and later graduated from Second Baptist High School in Houston as valedictorian in 1988.[11] During high school, Cruz participated in a Houston-based group called the Free Market Education Foundation where Cruz learned about free-market economic philosophers such as Milton Friedman, Friedrich Hayek, Frédéric Bastiat and Ludwig von Mises.[20] The program was run by Rolland Storey and Cruz entered the program at the age of 13.[18]
Cruz graduated cum laude from Princeton University with a Bachelor of Arts from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in 1992.[2][5] While at Princeton, he competed for the American Whig-Cliosophic Society’s Debate Panel and won the top speaker award at both the 1992 U.S. National Debating Championship and the 1992 North American Debating Championship.[27] In 1992, he was named U.S. National Speaker of the Year and Team of the Year (with his debate partner, David Panton).[27] Cruz was also a semi-finalist at the 1995 World Universities Debating Championship, making him Princeton’s highest-ranked debater at the championship.[28][29] Princeton’s debate team later named their annual novice championship after Cruz.[28]
Cruz’s senior thesis on the separation of powers, titled “Clipping the Wings of Angels,” draws its inspiration from a passage attributed to President James Madison: “If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.” Cruz argued that the drafters of the Constitution intended to protect the rights of their constituents, and the last two items in the Bill of Rights offered an explicit stop against an all-powerful state. Cruz wrote: “They simply do so from different directions. The Tenth stops new powers, and the Ninth fortifies all other rights, or non-powers.”[24][30]
After graduating from Princeton, Cruz attended Harvard Law School, graduating magna cum laude in 1995 with a Juris Doctor.[2][31] While at Harvard Law, Cruz was a primary editor of the Harvard Law Review, and executive editor of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, and a founding editor of the Harvard Latino Law Review.[5] Referring to Cruz’s time as a student at Harvard Law, Professor Alan Dershowitz said, “Cruz was off-the-charts brilliant.”[12][32][33][34][35][36] At Harvard Law, Cruz was a John M. Olin Fellow in Law and Economics.[37]