Posted on 10/15/2014 5:09:19 AM PDT by Patton@Bastogne
Patton@Bastogne is correct. Incorporating as a 501-C3 does not grant tax-exempt status to churches. Churches are automatically tax exempt as soon as they are formed—there are not any requirements as to ownership, structure or anything else.
What 501-C3 status does grant, like any other corporate body, is limitation of liability for church leaders. Churches without 501-C3 status can give legal tax receipts and perform legal marriages, but church leaders are personally liable for all church affairs. Under 501-C3, church leaders voluntarily place the church under government regulation in trade for limited liability.
Once a church is incorporated, they are subject to whatever the Feds decide. Without incorporation, the feds have no oversight, and would be in precarious legal territory with any challenge. Of course, personal lawsuits could be used to intimidate churches, but such suits would be played on a more even field.
Au contraire. In response to the civil disobedience of 1,600 pastors in 2012, the IRS has not touched any of the challenges. Not. One. Single. One.
Exactly right. If the government were allowed to tax churches, it could arbitrarily just tax the churches it doesn’t like out of existence. Tax exempt organizations have always been able to advocate based on public issues. Endorsing certain political candidates or raising money for them during church activities would be a different issue altogether.
Hey bitch...... if there is no law, there is no law
We would have to close every Black church.
If you think that only weak churches would close if subjected to to full taxation powers of the federal government you are deluding yourself. It is axiomatic that the power to tax is the power to destroy.
Only conservative churches are targeted. No liberal church will ever be subpoenaed or taxed for advocating homosexual marriage, abortion, socialism or black racism.
When all this liberal nonsense comes crashing down and backfires on these idiots it’s going to be epic.
A free people should not accept the UnConstitutional 'ruling' of partisan political government hacks in the IRS. These courageous pastors want their day in court on this issue. In this post-Lerner climate, the IRS will lose every day of the week.
In the immortal words of John F'ing Kerry, BRING IT ON!
There are cases to be made for churches to opt out of 501 3C designations, but not this one.
Exactly!
...do you have a video? ...website? /s
When Planned Parenthood gives up its tax exempt status then the churches will give up theirs. This Mayor is an idiot. If this is ever challenged the IRS will lose. There is no basis in the constitution for forfeiting a right granted in the Bill of Rights!!! Having said that I wish the all tax exempt statuses were eliminated by eliminating the IRS and go with a federal sales tax or something similar!!!
Legitimate churches should be entirely exempt from all government taxation and control regardless of whether they comply with 501c3 requirements for other tax exempt nonprofit organizations.
If your organization is not a church and you wish to be exempt from taxes then you have to comply with the applicable exemption requirements. If your organization is a church then you should be exempt from taxes regardless of what you church preaches.
You missed my point completely.
1. Churches dependent on God do not need tax-exempt status. It is a relatively new (50 years?) law that did not exist long ago.
2. By claiming that status, churches are only giving the gov. a basis for intruding. Don’t claim the status, you can say whatever you want - until things get like Nazi Germany....which may be not far away.
3. Real givers don’t concern themselves with getting a tax deduction. Few have income levels and giving levels where their tax-exempt giving actually benefits them. And if that is the basis for their giving, I question their motives. Christians I know give where they are led to give regardless of any tax benefit. Often the greatest need is where there is no tax benefit.
4. Claiming tax-exempt status is a form of the church depending on the world instead of on God.
As John Marshall said, "the power to tax is the power to destroy."
Good point. I guess I wasn’t looking at it in that light.
God is good and he will make all things right in the end.
Just sayin'. :)
You missed my point entirely. All churches should be tax exempt under the First Amendment regardless of how or what they preach.
Tax exemption is not just a matter of whether donors can deduct their contributions. It is also a matter of property tax exemption, sales tax exemption, income tax exemption and exemption from any other punitive tax that Obama or a future regime may want to impose on churches in the future.
The power to tax is not only the power to destroy. According to the Supreme Court’s Obamacare ruling, the power to tax is the power to do anything.
The corporate shield from personal liability has been a fundamental and the primary benefit of incorporation since the English common law. It predates regulation 501C-3 by three huhdred years. All corporate officers and directors are shielded from personal liability unless one can make incredibly difficult showing necessary to "pierce the corporate veil." (There are some specialty corporations such a Professional Corporations where this shield is less protective but they are the vast minority.) There are no Court cases in the country which hold that the government can condition the traditional legal corporate protections against personal liability on a waiver of 1st Amendment rights. I have never even heard the IRS make such a claim, they always try to condition the tax exempt status but have never been willing to fight the issue in court.
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