Posted on 07/27/2006 8:20:43 AM PDT by xzins
Five years ago, I wrote about threats made by the Internal Revenue Service against conservative churches for supposedly engaging in politicking. Today, the IRS is again attempting to chill free speech, sending notices to more than 15,000 non-profit organizations—including churches—regarding its new crackdown on political activity.
But what exactly constitutes political activity? What if a member of the clergy urges his congregation to work toward creating a pro-life culture, when an upcoming election features a pro-life candidate? What if a minister admonishes churchgoers that homosexuality is sinful, when an initiative banning gay marriage is on an upcoming ballot? Where exactly do we draw the line, and when does the IRS begin to violate the First amendment’s guarantee of free exercise of religion?
I agree with my colleague Walter Jones of North Carolina that the political views of any particular church or its members are none of the government’s business. Congressman Jones introduced legislation that addresses this very serious issue of IRS harassment of churches engaging in conservative political activity. This bill is badly needed to end the IRS practice of threatening certain politically disfavored faiths with loss of their tax-exempt status, while ignoring the very open and public political activities of other churches. While some well-known leftist preachers routinely advocate socialism from the pulpit, many conservative Christian and Jewish congregations cannot present their political beliefs without risking scrutiny from the tax collector.
The supposed motivation behind the ban on political participation by churches is the need to maintain a rigid separation between church and state. However, the First amendment simply prohibits the federal government from passing laws that establish religion or prohibit the free exercise of religion. There certainly is no mention of any "separation of church and state," yet lawmakers and judges continually assert this mythical doctrine.
The result is court rulings and laws that separate citizens from their religious beliefs in all public settings, in clear violation of the free exercise clause. Our Founders never envisioned a rigidly secular public society, where people must nonsensically disregard their deeply held beliefs in all matters of government and politics. They certainly never imagined that the federal government would actively work to chill the political activities of some churches.
Speech is speech, regardless of the setting. There is no legal distinction between religious expression and political expression; both are equally protected by the First amendment. Religious believers do not drop their political opinions at the door of their place of worship, nor do they disregard their faith at the ballot box. Religious morality will always inform the voting choices of Americans of all faiths.
The political left, however, seeks to impose the viewpoint that public life must be secular, and that government cannot reflect morality derived from faith. Many Democrats, not all, are threatened by strong religious institutions because they want an ever-growing federal government to serve as the unchallenged authority in our society. So the real motivation behind the insistence on a separation of church and state is not based on respect for the First amendment, but rather on a desire to diminish the influence of religious conservatives at the ballot box.
The Constitution's guarantee of religious freedom must not depend on the whims of IRS bureaucrats. Religious institutions cannot freely preach their beliefs if they must fear that the government will accuse them of "politics." We cannot allow churches to be silenced any more than we can allow political dissent in general to be silenced. Free societies always have strong, independent institutions that are not afraid to challenge and criticize the government.
Once again, should a Tide TV commercial be taxed?
Is that tide commercial political speech? Or is it commerce regulatable under the Article I Section 8 of the constitution.
As freedom of speech regards exercise of religion and political speech. If the Tide commercial is clearly either then obviously the donations for it should not be taxed regardless of coming from individual or assemblage of individuals.
Hmm, is Tide being taxed on the funds paid for that commercial?
I recall algore fund raising in Buddhist temples while billyboy philandered his legacy away in public view, and not one conservative pastor seemed able to utter a single word in protest. Ain't amerika great?
Carolyn
Pardon my ignorance of tax laws, but I had assumed that a PAC might be responsible for taxes that a church is not like property tax or tax on sales receipts from selling propaganda videos or other paraphanelia like tee-shirts or coffee mugs. As far as I know, there is no special income treatment for contributions to PACs as there is for a church. Personally, I'd rather it remain that way- there are way too many evil people with way too much money, i.e. George Soros.
Of course they did.
"Take away these proscriptions and let them be tax exempt and it would allow them to be able to address issues of public importance without having to worry about the IRS breathing down their throats. "
Better by far would be to take away all those "proscriptions" as well as the income tax laws and the IRS and not tax income at all, but tax only end user consumption. Done this way there would be no ability of the government to interfere in it's present manner.
We can do this RIGHT NOW by supporting the FairTax bill (HR25) and helping to pass it into law. Write all of your congressmen asking them to support, cosponsor and vote for the FairTax as written, It will help you AND your church hugely - not to mention the entire country.
I told my son-in-law while he was a raging Clinton liberal in college a few years ago that someday we would talk about the "Hertz Donut".
4th of July we were just chatting about stuff, his new job as a pharmaceutical rep came up and he started complaining about taxes:
"TD, they're taking about *half* what I make!"
My response: "Hurts, don't it?"
It's time for the FairTax!!!
Funny, the First Amendment does not differentiate between political and non-political speech. So now you are the arbiter of what is First Amendment Speech and what is not? Hmmm - guess you're not the First Amendment absolutist you claim to be. Have a nice day.
See my post #250.
Tuesday November 7, 2000; 9:37 AM ET-PJJesse Jackson Jr. Says Church Politicking 'Supersedes the Law'
It may be against federal election law to campaign in church. But for Democrats seeking to get out the vote in minority districts, politicking from the pulpit has become indispensable.
In the last days of this year's campaign, Vice President Al Gore, Senate candidate Hillary Clinton and her husband have all made regular appearances at African-American and Hispanic churches.
Even when parishioners objected to Mrs. Clinton campaigning from the altar at a Rochester, N.Y., Catholic church last week, the rules were not enforced. Those who didn't like it were simply ejected by police while the first lady continued her campaign speech.
Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr., whose namesake is both a reverend and one of the Democratic Party's most vocal boosters, was challenged on the issue Monday during a Tennessee radio interview on WLAC-AM by "Nashville This Morning" hosts Steve Gill and Terry Hopkins.
GILL: Let me ask you about this. It's against IRS regulations for politicians to campaign from the pulpit. Why are these politicians campaigning in black churches?
JACKSON: I'm not totally convinced that's true in the African-American community. Certainly there's a separation of church and state. But in our community there's little distinction between our religion and our politics. ... And so in many African-American churches born out of experience in this country, the role of the churches has evolved into a very, very active political institution which has been very effective for a number of causes in the black community.
HOPKINS: And that supersedes the law?
JACKSON: Absolutely. Oh, absolutely.
I had assumed that a PAC might be responsible for taxes that a church is not like property tax or tax on sales receipts from selling propaganda videos or other paraphanelia like tee-shirts or coffee mugs.
You had better look into the federal tax law again, churches are subject to the same federaL tax laws regarding their commercial enterprises as every other organization.
Their exemptions regard contributions to them. They pay the same federal payroll taxes and same taxes on their commercial enterprises and anyone else.
As far as property tax is concerned, there are no federal property taxes, those would be a direct tax under the constitution and can only be laid by apportionment among the states by population.
State tax however is an entirely separate issue, with powers of the state legislatures comprehended by the 10th amendment and state constitutions.
It's about the state trying to curtail speech it doesn't like.
As I stated this isn't what our founding fathers had in mind.
Tax exemptions isn't just about chartiable exemptions. It's also about anything related to the groups agenda.
Those things are remnants of a long ago era when WWI was getting going. They are not needed under an even better tax system than the income tax. the FairTax is the one that offers freedom. Exemptions and deductions do not.
BTTT!!!!!!!
There are clear boundaries as to the limits for tax-exempt activity. For-profit commerce. Politics.
End of story. If you want preferential tax treatment, follow the rules to get that preference. It's the case with every government tax break. Not willing to adhere to those rules? Then you get taxed the same as everyone else not following those rules.
Jackson doesn't understand the issues, based on his statements, but the truth is that there is no government authorization in the constitution to clamp down on church free speech.
It's still a use by government to control behavior using the tax code which should be made impossible as it is under the FairTax.
-PJ
Dude - the point is, these folks are not lobbying to remove such government controls. They just want to be exempt from those controls while the controls remain in effect on others.
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