Fred Phelps is a disbarred civil rights lawyer. His friend : Al Gore.
Posted on 07/18/2006 6:51:34 AM PDT by Mr. Brightside
Today: July 18, 2006 at 6:30:28 PDT
IRS Warns Churches to Avoid Campaigning
ASSOCIATED PRESS
LOS ANGELES (AP) - The Internal Revenue Service has been warning churches and nonprofit organizations that improper campaigning in the upcoming political season could endanger their tax-exempt status.
In notices to more than 15,000 tax-exempt organizations, numerous church denominations and tax preparers, the agency has detailed its new enforcement program, called the Political Activity Compliance Initiative, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday.
Under the initiative, the IRS plans to expedite investigations into claims of improper campaigning, no longer waiting for an annual tax return to be filed or the tax year to end before launching a probe. A three-member committee will make an initial review of complaints and then vote on whether to pursue the investigation in detail.
"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 W. Everson said in a statement. "The rule against political campaign intervention by charities and churches is long established. We are stepping up our efforts to enforce it."
Since 2004, the IRS has investigated more than 200 organizations, including All Saints Church in Pasadena.
Two days before the 2004 presidential election, the Rev. George F. Regas, the church's former rector, delivered a guest sermon that pictured Jesus in a debate with George W. Bush and John Kerry. Although Regas didn't endorse a candidate, he said Jesus would have told Bush that his pre-emptive war policy "has led to disaster."
The church drew national attention when the Rev. Ed Bacon, rector of All Saints, disclosed the IRS investigation and later said the agency believed the church had violated federal tax code barring tax-exempt organizations from intervening in political campaigns and elections.
Church leaders have not heard from the IRS since October, when the agency said the investigation was being taken to a higher level, according to Regas. The IRS has not confirmed whether the investigation is still ongoing.
Of the 62 organizations determined by the IRS to be in violation, three lost their nonprofit status and 59 received warning letters. The three who lost their status were not churches, and some of those warned were ordered to pay an excise tax.
Federal law prohibits the IRS from releasing the names of those under investigation, but the agency said it has more than 100 cases pending and 40 of them are churches.
This month, OMB Watch, a Washington-based nonprofit government watchdog group, issued a report criticizing the IRS enforcement program and said the program could prompt retaliatory and harassment complaints unless the agency develops clear guidelines.
"I don't think this is a case of bad faith," said Kay Guinane, author of the report. "I just think it's a poorly structured program."
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you're so right, Mr. Brightside.
Democratic Vice Presidential candidate John Edwards came to town yesterday, visited Allen Temple A.M.E., and had Rev. Donald Jordan say this:
"I know he is going to be president of the United States," Rev. Donald Jordan told a cheering capacity congregation of 1,200. "The Republicans have no one who can compare to him. I ask your support of him."
http://www.cincypost.com/2004/10/25/edw102504.html
Yeah, I'd love to watch the flailing if the IRS ever took the urban black churches to task on political activities.
This applies only to white churches..........
"Al Sharpton, right, leads a prayer in a Miami church with Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry, left, and Jesse L. Jackson. (Jim Young -- Reuters) "
Never stop DUmocrats....rules are never enforced when DUmocrats blatantly violate them in view of everyone.
Maybe abolish the IRS, then.
"I suppose Jesse Jackson will be exempt. Floyd Flake will be exempt. And the black pastors who endorsed Kerry from the pulpit will be exempt."
The problem with your theory is that the one example given in the story is a pastor who made it clear he would vote for Kerry.
The Internal Revenue Service has been warning churches and nonprofit organizations that improper campaigning in the upcoming political season could endanger their tax-exempt status.
Will the NPOs and churches be scrutinized equally, regardless of which "side" they support?
Just wondering
Let's not forget Planned Parenthood, the Teachers' Union, AFL-CIO, NOW, Move-On etc.
later read
"....rules are never enforced when DUmocrats blatantly violate them in view of everyone."
Read the story. The one example given is the IRS going after a church after a preacher because he made it clear he would vote for Kerry.
Echo.
I guess that puts the kabosh on Mitt Romney's campaign too.
First, the income tax is an abomination in that it violates free speech. Assuming that this IRS interpretation of it is accurate, which I think it is not....for that reason alone, it should be struck down.
Second, since the 1st amendment protects my free exercise of religion, anything that impedes that free exercise is a violation. The tax exemption for churches is a necessary interpretation of a constitutional right and it is not a matter of some cockamamie interpretation of the IRS.
If you take some of my money that I put in the offering plate then you have hindered by worship of God. Therefore, my exercise of my religion was not "free;" rather, it was HINDERED.
I don't really care who disagrees with me on this, even if it's the Chief Justice of the Scotus. You can't take money that I've designated for one thing, and use it for another thing, and claim that you haven't hindered my intent.
And Mosques. All non-Christian churches are exempt.
These black churches in particular, along with the "mainstream" Methodist, Prebyterian and Episcopalian churhces should be ESPECIALLY be scrutinized and targeted.
Official Methodist newletters have turned into nothing short of anti-American yellow journalistic rags, attacking the Second Amendment and American foreign policy in the war against Islam.
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