Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list
Posted on 08/21/2006 8:02:25 AM PDT by markomalley
WASHINGTON (National Catholic Register) – In June, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service put churches on notice for the 2006 campaign season. It said it would step up enforcement of its rules governing political participation by churches and other tax-exempt religious organizations.
So does this mean that bishops, priests and other Catholic leaders are in jeopardy of being muzzled in key political debates?
No, according to Tom Nash, director of special projects for Steubenville, Ohio-based Catholics United for the Faith. He said that Catholic organizations can speak out freely on political issues without fear of losing their tax-exempt status.
“The existing law allows church entities to still preach the gospel – to speak out on issues – without having to violate the law,” Nash said. “What is prohibited by the IRS is speaking out on a particular candidate, saying vote for this one or don’t vote for this one – naming names or explicitly taking sides.”
Concerns about a possible IRS “crackdown” against religious groups arose after the IRS announced its plan to ramp up enforcement of its Political Activity Compliance Initiative.
“While the vast majority of charities and churches do not engage in politicking, an increasing number did take part in prohibited activities in the 2004 election cycle,” IRS Commissioner Mark Everson said in a June 1 press statement. “The rule against political campaign intervention by charities and churches is long established. We are stepping up our efforts to enforce it.”
Churches and other nonprofit religious organizations qualify for tax-free status under the provisions of Sec. 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.
Under the IRS’ interpretation of Sec. 501(c)(3), as set forth in IRS Publication 1828, religious organizations are allowed to take public positions on issues of concern but may not provide direct support to individual candidates or indicate that voters should vote for or against specific candidates.
The IRS does not ban religious leaders from endorsing candidates, but they must do so as individuals rather than as official representatives of their church or religious organization.
Churches may invite individual candidates to speak on church property and also may host candidate forums. But in both cases, a church must not appear to favor an individual candidate.
A range of penalties can be imposed for violations of the IRS rules. The most significant is the loss of tax-exempt status.
The IRS has not modified these rules for the current election cycle. But it has increased enforcement through the Political Activity Compliance Initiative by launching investigations of alleged violations earlier in the election year and by increasing the number of investigators.
Bishops targeted
In 2004, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State called for an IRS investigation of Bishop Michael Sheridan of Colorado Springs, Colo., after Bishop Sheridan published a pastoral letter saying that Catholics should vote against candidates who support abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem-cell research.
Barry Lynn, the organization’s executive director, said in a May 2004 press release that Bishop Sheridan was “using a form of religious blackmail to steer votes toward the GOP.”
In an interview this month with the National Catholic Register, Lynn said he was pleased that the IRS was stepping up enforcement of its rules on political activity by churches and religious organizations.
“I think that disposing of these complaints and taking them seriously is a very important step,” said Lynn.
The pro-abortion lobby group Catholics for a Free Choice, which has been denounced by the U.S. bishops’ conference for falsely claiming to be an authentically Catholic organization, filed complaints with the IRS in 2004 against Archbishop Raymond Burke of St. Louis and Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver.
Neither Archbishop Chaput nor Archbishop Burke named specific candidates in the 2004 elections that Catholics should vote for or against. But the pro-abortion activists claimed the archbishops had violated IRS rules by their forceful assertions that Catholic voters should vote for pro-life candidates and against candidates who support abortion and other anti-life positions.
Asked by the National Catholic Register about the outcome of complaints filed in 2004 against Catholic organizations, IRS spokesman Bruce Friedland said via e-mail that Sec. 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code prohibits disclosure of such information.
But it appears the IRS concluded that the 2004 complaints against the three Catholic bishops had little merit. St. Louis archdiocesan spokesman Tony Huenneke said the archdiocese had not been contacted about the issue, and Bishop Sheridan told the National Catholic Register Aug. 11, “We never heard from the IRS.”
Jeanette De Melo, director of communications for the archdiocese of Denver, said that the archdiocese has a policy of not commenting on whether the IRS has contacted the archdiocese about such complaints. In any case, De Melo said, “We’re still going to preach the gospel and the teachings of the church, and we’re going to do that in every way that we possibly can.”
Catholic Answers
California-based Catholic Answers, which distributed 10 million copies of its “Voter’s Guide for Serious Catholics” in 2004, was also targeted by an IRS complaint from Catholics for a Free Choice.
The “Voter’s Guide” identifies five issues as “non-negotiable” issues that must always be opposed: abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem-cell research, human cloning and homosexual “marriage.”
Jimmy Akin, director of communications for Catholic Answers Action, said that while some modifications have been made in 2006 to the “Voter’s Guide” none resulted from the IRS complaint, which he described as an attempt to “intimidate” Catholic Answers.
But the guide is being published this year by Catholic Answers Action, rather than Catholic Answers, “in order to prevent frivolous complaints,” Akin said.
Catholic Answers Action is a 501(c)(4) non-profit organization. Such groups are designated by the IRS as tax-exempt social welfare organizations and operate under different regulations than religious 501(c)(3) groups.
Catholic Answers Action has posted an independent legal opinion on its Web site (www.caaction.com). The opinion, by the Indiana-based law firm of Bopp, Coleson & Bostrom, states that because the “Voter’s Guide” “is issue advocacy and not political intervention pursuant to the Internal Revenue Code,” it may be distributed by church groups without jeopardizing their tax-exempt status.
Potential problem?
OMB Watch, a non-profit federal watchdog group that primarily monitors fiscal and budgetary issues, has warned that the IRS’ stepped-up enforcement could pose a threat to legitimate political activities undertaken by tax-exempt religious organizations.
“The IRS’ new approach to enforcement could hamper nonpartisan issue advocacy and voter education and mobilization efforts,” OMB Watch said in a May 2006 report. “Our concerns derive mainly from the lack of a bright line rule defining what is partisan and what is not, coupled with ‘fast-track’ procedures.”
OMB Watch said that its review of the IRS’s Political Activity Compliance Initiative had found that there “is not widespread violation of the ban on intervention in elections.” And, the watchdog group said, the IRS “should make clear that a charity’s right to criticize elected officials is not suspended because an election is taking place.”
But Catholics United for the Faith’s Tom Nash said that the federal tax code still affords Catholics plenty of latitude to uphold their faith through the democratic process, in a way that transcends political partisanship.
“One can still be ‘wise as serpents’ and yet ‘innocent as doves,’” Nash said, citing the example given in the 2004 election cycle by Archbishop Burke, Bishop Chaput and Archbishop Sheridan about highlighting the primacy of the life issues when deciding how to vote.
Added Nash, “You can speak out on certain issues, saying that these issues have primacy. And therefore, for ‘those who have eyes to see and ears to hear’, they will receive that gospel message.”
Yet they act holier than thou.
No, thanks.
Wouldn't it be refreshing if the IRS came down on the Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton bunch. It'll never happen though.
And that is entirely LEGAL. Churches can talk about moral issues until the cows come home. They may even endorse ballot initiatives and direct their faithful to vote accordingly. The only thing they may not do is endorse individual candidates by name.
Why isn't the IRS concerned about Democrat campaign rallies organized by Black churches? What about the other non profits like environmental groups? The law should be uniformly enforced.
Do conservatives ever play hardball with lefty or minority churches endorsing issues or candidates? I hope not, because it means we've sunk to their tactics of intimidation.
This would not be an issue if The Fair Tax Act was passed because it would abolish the IRS. More information can be found at The Americans For Fair Taxation website. Fair Tax ping!This wouldn't be an issue under the FairTax because churches would pay tax on all their purchases except for those that are for resell or export or purchases to help produce such items. In fact, the Americans for Fair Taxation, themselves, show non-profit organizations (including religious organizations) would have paid $60 billion in FairTax in 2003.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.